Digital markets

In the EU, the Digital Markets Act is being implemented and will be enforced. In the UK, the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill provides the legal framework pursuant to which the Digital Markets Unit will operate. These new regimes seek to open up digital ecosystems to competition and therefore stimulate innovation and economic growth. Businesses that rely on the digital platforms should benefit from a level playing field. 

Much work will be done in the next few years to draft, interpret and enforce the rules applying to large platforms. You will want to engage in the process to ensure the new rules on issues such as digital ecosystems, AI and the metaverse fulfil their objective of enabling your business to grow.  

Our firm represents a wide variety of broadcasters, news publishers, app developers, gaming companies, ad tech companies, search engines, e-commerce sellers and other companies in the development of the new regimes and in ongoing competition cases. 

• We have been involved in most of the competition law investigations launched by the CMA and European Commission, including their investigations into Google’s ad tech practices and Apple and Google’s app stores practices. 

• Our firm enjoys significant expertise in competition litigation in the tech sector. In 2022, we filed a collective action against Google seeking compensation for hundreds of thousands of online content publishers for the damage they suffered from Google’s anticompetitive action in the ad tech sector. 

• Our firm is a key player in helping to shape the new regimes though substantive submissions to regulators and governments. We are also heavily involved in researching and creating academic articles and speeches discussing how digital regulation should be designed and shaped to stimulate competition in digital markets.  

• Our firm produces the widely acclaimed Platform Law Blog, which is read by thousands of policy makers and competition officials involved in digital regulation. Damien Geradin has interviewed both the CEO of the UK’s CMA and the key MEP architect of the EU’s regime for the blog.  

• We act as counsel to the Coalition for App Fairness for UK and EU competition matters. We co-founded the Responsible Online Commerce Coalition, which represents the interests of businesses who rely on Amazon and other e-commerce platforms to reach their customers. 

• Our lawyers have given evidence to the European Commission, the Furman commission, and the UK Parliament’s digital select committee and public bill committee. 

• We are widely quoted in the media such as the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, Politico, Tech Crunch, Bloomberg News and the Daily Mail. 

Our firm’s expertise, in-depth knowledge and experience can help guide businesses through the entire lifecycle of these issues, from initial strategizing and influencing the drafting of the rules through to regulatory investigations and finally damages litigation. 

We can help you to ensure that you comply with competition law, defend you when under investigation, or object to competition law violations by others. We can help to guide you through the merger control process for your acquisition or joint venture. 

Geradin Partners is at the forefront of the new digital regulatory regimes in the UK, EU and worldwide. Our team comprises three former senior officials of the UK Competition and Markets Authority, including one director who co-led the Digital Markets Taskforce, which advised the UK Government on digital regulation.