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 Newsletter

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 States

This year brings the commencement or increase in enforcement of three major privacy initiatives. First, on March 1, 2010, Massachusetts began enforcement of its specific, and as many would claim, onerous privacy regulation. While only a Massachusetts state regulation, the implementing law states that its jurisdictional reach is to all businesses that possess personal information about a Massachusetts resident. Thus, although this jurisdictional claim has…

Read More Practical Application of Consumer Privacy Laws to Franchised Businesses*

Consumer protection and antitrust attorneys seeking to prevent class certifications have three powerful, but underused, defenses upon which they can rely: a completed, a pending, or an anticipated government investigation or lawsuit (collectively, government action). In certain circumstances, these potential defenses could result in denial of a class certification motion, as a court may find that due to the government action, a class action lawsuit…

Read More What is Superiority?

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 Payers

Wiggin and Dana proudly announces the release of the Unfair Trade Practices (Vol. 12, Connecticut Practice Series) 2006 Pocket Part. The 300 page pocket part contains an extensive discussion of the “unfairness doctrine” that is considered “must reading” for practitioners in the field. The Pocket contains a new antitrust chapter, Chapter 9, not found in the original book.

The co-authors of the Unfair Trade Practices…

Read More Unfair Trade Practices (Volume 12, Connecticut Practice Series)

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 Patents

Over the past decade, there has been a growing concern that plaintiffs’ lawyers increasingly filed large, national class actions in certain state court venues perceived to be very favorable to plaintiffs. These locations including Madison County, Illinois; Jefferson County, Texas; and Palm Beach County, Florida have been called everything from “magnet” jurisdictions to “magic” jurisdictions. Despite the fact that these class actions often involved plaintiffs…

Read More Class Action Fairness Act of 2005

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

Antitrust practitioners generally consider themselves well-versed in key antitrust principles, cases, and developments. They freely allude to “Colgate” and “GTE Sylvania” — meaning something other than toothpaste and televisions — in their everyday conversation. To remain at the top of their trade, they make an effort to stay current on the evolution of antitrust doctrines emanating from the U.S. Supreme Court and the application and…

Read More So You Think You’re Safe Under the Antitrust Laws? A Word of Advice to Those Who Would Ignore the States

About Our Practice

Clients turn to Wiggin and Dana’s Antitrust and Technology Disputes Practice Group because of our broad experience litigating and advising on a wide variety of complex antitrust and technology issues.
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