Cartel Defense & Investigations

Regulators are placing greater scrutiny on transactions, pricing practices, and competitor conduct. Our antitrust lawyers partner with you to pursue strategic growth opportunities while navigating regulatory pressure across global markets – helping you reduce the risk of business disruption, financial exposure, and reputational damage.

Our antitrust lawyers provide coordinated guidance across US and international competition laws. From strategic transactions and government investigations to commercial counseling and competition disputes, we work with you to manage antitrust risk wherever it arises.

We represent companies and individuals in antitrust investigations, enforcement actions, and competition disputes across US and international markets. Our lawyers advise you on matters involving the US Department of Justice (DOJ), Federal Trade Commission (FTC), European Commission, EU Member State authorities, and other global competition agencies. We guide you through cartel investigations, class actions, civil antitrust litigation, and other regulatory proceedings tied to antitrust and competition law.

We also help you navigate merger clearance, foreign investment reviews, competition approvals, and regulatory filing strategies. We regularly serve as specialized antitrust counsel focused on merger clearance and competition approvals in complex domestic and cross-border transactions.

Competition laws influence your day-to-day business operations. To help you manage risk under evolving antitrust requirements, our lawyers advise you on pricing strategies, distribution structures, competitor collaborations, trade association conduct, exclusive arrangements, and compliance programs. By understanding how regulators evaluate competitive conduct, we guide you to make informed business decisions that reduce antitrust exposure.

Antitrust and competition issues frequently involve overlapping considerations. Our antitrust lawyers partner with you to manage competition risk across jurisdictions. Whether you are pursuing a transaction, structuring a commercial arrangement, or responding to a government investigation, we help you navigate regulatory scrutiny strategically while protecting your ability to compete and grow across global markets.

They got great results for us in our toughest litigation. In court, they are fierce competitors and well-prepared advocates.
– client testimonial

McDermott Will & Schulte lawyers have been on many of the landmark antitrust litigation cases of this century. From securing summary judgment in the precedent-setting price-fixing chocolate confectionary litigation to prevailing on behalf of several hospital systems in the first batch of wage-fixing class actions, we have successfully litigated and defended on appeal the full gamut of novel antitrust cases.

Clients turn to us for our enviable track record in cutting-edge matters and unparalleled experience as lead counsel on actions involving:

• Price-fixing
• Cartels
• Monopolization
• Tying
• Dealer terminations
• Group boycotts and refusals to deal
• Exclusive dealing
• Antitrust counterclaims in patent and trademark litigation
• Litigated challenges to mergers and acquisitions

Our antitrust class action defense lawyers are some of the most experienced in the United States, and we are on the pulse of litigating private competition law damages claims in Europe. We regularly represent clients before foreign and domestic regulatory agencies, including the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the US Department of Justice (DOJ), state attorneys general and the European Commission (EC) Directorate-General for Competition. We also represent clients in competition litigation in European Union and Member State courts.

Members of our team previously held key positions regulatory and law enforcement agencies, including the FTC, the DOJ and the EC.

Who We Represent

Understanding our clients’ industries is paramount to litigation success. Our experience encompasses most markets, and we regularly deliver results for clients from all sectors of the economy, including the following:

• Consumer products
• Food, beverage and agribusiness
• Healthcare
• Life sciences
• Financial services
• Insurance
• E-commerce
• Digital advertising
• Aerospace and defense
• Chemicals
• Energy
• Manufacturing
• Technology

Based in our Brussels office, McDermott Will & Schulte’s EU Competition team provides end-to-end antitrust and competition representation before the European Commission, other EU institutions and the various national competition authorities.

Our multilingual, multinational team of competition lawyers counsels clients on the entire spectrum of competition issues, including:

• Merger clearance, including structuring and presenting transactions, managing notification processes for multinational transactions, and developing timely, cost-effective strategies for obtaining regulatory clearance
• Cartels, including providing coordinated advice in the EU, United States and elsewhere to defend international cartel investigations and prosecutions
• Horizontal and vertical agreements, including advising on joint research and development, standardization, and supply and distribution agreements
• Abuse of dominance, including defense of companies against regulatory allegations and private complaints of infringement, and pursuing redress on behalf of clients victimized by dominant competitors and suppliers
• State aid, including analyzing the legal situation and drafting documents
• Compliance, including performing competition law compliance audits and helping clients address related regulations involving commercial bribery, data protection, privacy, trade and intellectual property
• Competition litigation, including providing sophisticated defense of clients in national and EU courts in class actions and multi-jurisdictional proceedings.

Our clients include many of the premier international enterprises whose products are major household names, as well as many of the world’s top manufacturers, suppliers, distributors and service providers. We have firsthand experience and a deep understanding of the industries in which our clients operate, including life sciences, chemicals, energy, food and beverages, manufacturing, technology and networks.

[McDermott Will & Schulte has] considerable expertise in handling complicated merger clearances.
– Chambers USA

Our team's global antitrust and competition team has extensive experience in all facets of the merger review process. We understand the concerns of business leaders and regulators alike across the world and have a reputation for success in even the most difficult, complex deals.

Companies need to navigate multiple regulatory regimes to complete their M&A transactions, including antitrust reviews, foreign investment notifications and foreign subsidies regulation. Our team's practical, efficient advice helps clients navigate these regimes and delivers successful outcomes to get their deals closed. With lawyers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, France and Belgium, our team prepares our clients for merger regulatory trends and new regimes.

Antitrust/Competition Law Filings and Clearance

In the increasingly complex regulatory landscape, businesses must have a captain with the experience necessary to handle government investigations and coordinate across filing regimes.

We regularly defend clients in merger-related antitrust investigations and inquiries before the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the US Department of Justice (DOJ), the European Commission (EC) and other international jurisdictions. We work hand-in-hand with clients at every step, from the earliest transaction consideration through the initial waiting period and, when required, compliance with agency requests for additional information, including “second requests.” When necessary, we vigorously defend transactions in court.

We also represent third parties that wish to oppose transactions before the FTC, DOJ and regulatory bodies in other major jurisdictions, and we manage local counsel effectively when filings are required in locations where we do not have an office. In addition, we assist companies in obtaining regulatory clearance for their purchase of assets being sold under a divesture order. For example, we represented FactSet in obtaining EC-suitable purchaser approval for its acquisition of S&P’s CUSIP Global Services business for $1.9 billion when that business had to be divested to resolve EC concerns with the merger between S&P and IHS Markit.

Clients value our ability to overcome regulatory hurdles and to do so quickly. The key to our success is our technically skilled and practically oriented team, including many former regulators with outstanding relationships with investigators and prosecutors. Globally, we anticipate issues rather than wait for regulators to find problems. We learn the industry and clearly communicate with agency staff so that we can address issues early on and avoid a lengthy investigation where possible.

We continue to explore creative ways to obtain merger clearances swiftly and efficiently. For example, we obtained a very rare derogation (non-enforcement) of the premerger waiting period in an acquisition that needed to be closed very rapidly to comply with European Union (EU) regulations arising from the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. Our team brings significant depth in navigating the multifaceted and complex intricacies of compliance with the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act (HSR) and multijurisdictional merger filing analysis. We have a large HSR team, headed by a former member of the FTC’s Premerger Notification Office who is highly skilled in assessing transactions for reportability, reporting and expediting transactions wherever possible. Our team is one of the most frequent filers, and we recently made over 100 HSR filings in a single year.

Foreign Direct Investment

The number of jurisdictions imposing foreign direct investment (FDI) filing requirements is growing substantially in light of changing geopolitical dynamics and the increasing use of cross-border restrictions to support national security interests. Our team has the practical know-how to navigate FDI regimes around the world to manage the filing strategy for our clients wherever needed. Clients benefit from leveraging not only our in-house global team but also our strong relationships with peer firms and local experts across the world. We provide prefiling screenings for reportability and lead the filing process from start to finish.

Foreign Subsidies Regulation

The EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation (FSR) implemented in 2023 presents an unprecedented regulatory obstacle for global M&A transactions. We guide clients through the additional hurdles and mandatory filing requirements and advise on developing and implementing proactive tracking procedures for financial contributions received from non-EU member states to allow companies to comply with the new regulation.