It is a cardinal rule of antitrust that—absent very limited exceptions—parties can do business with, or refuse to do business with, whomever they choose. The Supreme Court solidified that premise in United States v. Colgate & Co.1 and has reiterated it time and again.2 Recent state legislation and lawsuits arising in the contact lens industry are threatening to dismantle that bedrock principle
Read More Unilateral Price Policies in the Contact Lens Industry: Can Manufacturers Be Forced to Sell to Every Retailer?Erica Amarante
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Competition News, June 2015
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Unilateral Price Policies in the Contact Lens Industry: Can Manufacturers Be Forced to Sell to Every Retailer?
It is a cardinal rule of antitrust that – absent very limited exceptions – parties can do business, or refuse to do business, with whomever they choose. The Supreme Court solidified that premise in United States v. Colgate & Co., 250 U.S. 300, 307 (1919), and has…
Read More Competition News, June 2015FTC Announces New Premerger-Notification and Interlocking-Directorate Thresholds
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The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced its annual adjustment of the thresholds for premerger notification filings under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act (HSR), as well its adjustment for the thresholds for prohibitions on certain interlocking directorates under Section 8 of the Clayton Act.
The new HSR thresholds will be effective thirty days after publication in the Federal Register. Publication is expected sometime during the week of…
Read More FTC Announces New Premerger-Notification and Interlocking-Directorate ThresholdsFTC Publishes Revised Guides for Advertising Allowances and Other Merchandising Payments
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Recently, for the first time in 24 years, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) published revisions to its guidelines on advertising allowances and other promotional payments and services, widely known as the Fred Meyer Guides (“Guides”). Originally published in 1969, the Guides explain Sections 2(d) and 2(e) of the Robinson-Patman Act, which require a seller that pays for or provides promotional allowances to customers to do…
Read More FTC Publishes Revised Guides for Advertising Allowances and Other Merchandising PaymentsThe FTC’s Revised Green Guides
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On October 1, 2012, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued final revisions to its Guides for the Use of Environmental Marketing Claims (Green Guides or Guidance). The FTC will publish the more than 300-page Green Guides in the Federal Register at 16 C.F.R. Part 260; you may review the text of the Guidance here and at the FTC’s website. Though the Guidance does not…
Read More The FTC’s Revised Green GuidesAntitrust and Consumer Protection Newsletter
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In This Issue:
- FTC and DOJ Issue Revised Horizontal Merger Guidelines
- Wiggin and Dana Authors Influential Brief on Confidentiality of Documents Produced Under an Antitrust Subpoena
- Resale Price Maintenance Redux
- In-House Attorney/Client Communications Are Not Privileged In The European Union
FTC AND DOJ ISSUE REVISED HORIZONTAL MERGER GUIDELINES
On August 19, 2010, the Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission (the “Agencies”) issued Revised…
Read More Antitrust and Consumer Protection NewsletterSo You Still Think You’re Safe Under the Antitrust Laws? Another Word of Advice To Those Who Would Ignore The States
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Eight years ago, in the fall of 2002, we authored an article in the pages of the Antitrust Report that warned of the dangers of assuming that state antitrust law would always be the same as its federal counterpart.1 That warning is even more salient today than when originally written. The United States Supreme Court’s 2007 decision in Leegin Creative Leather Products, Inc. v.
Read More So You Still Think You’re Safe Under the Antitrust Laws? Another Word of Advice To Those Who Would Ignore The StatesSignificant Developments in Clinical Integration: Federal Trade Commission Opinion Approves of Physician-Hospital Organization Proposal to Negotiate Jointly with Payers
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On April 13, 2009, the Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Competition, Health Care Division (“BC”) issued a 37-page Advisory Opinion (“Opinion”) to TriState Health Partners, Inc. (“TriState”), a physician-hospital organization based in Hagerstown, Maryland, stating that the BC would not recommend that the Commission challenge TriState’s proposed clinical integration program under the antitrust laws. The Opinion is noteworthy because it provides the most detailed discussion…
Read More Significant Developments in Clinical Integration: Federal Trade Commission Opinion Approves of Physician-Hospital Organization Proposal to Negotiate Jointly with PayersIndependent Ink: Supreme Court Abandons Market Power Presumption of Patents
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Franchisors that own intellectual property (patents, copyrights, or trademarks)for use as part of the franchise system have long been confronted with an unfortunate and misguided presumption that their intellectual property rights automatically gave them market power — an essential element of many antitrust claims — in the system’s patented, copyrighted, or trademarked products and services. From an antitrust perspective, this presumption, although rebuttable, created a…
Read More Independent Ink: Supreme Court Abandons Market Power Presumption of PatentsAntitrust and Franchising: Conspiracies Between Franchisors and Franchisees Under Section 1
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A 1993 article in this Journal reported, without fanfare, a federal district court ‘s holding that a “franchisor and franchisee were legally incapable of conspiring” in restraint of trade.1 Since that time, two other district courts and two courts of appeals have echoed that decision.2
Resources
Reprinted with permission from the Franchise Law Journal (American Bar Association), Volume 23, Number 1, Summer 2003
Read More Antitrust and Franchising: Conspiracies Between Franchisors and Franchisees Under Section 1