Global Competition Law is primarly a practitioner's guide presenting the most salient aspects of the major competition laws country by country, giving an overview of their structure and most charasteristic elements.
Global Competition Law also provides insight into possible future developments in the field.

Global Competition Law

Section 4(1) of the Competition Act prohibits a horizontal agreement or concerted practice if (a) it has the effect of substantially preventing, or lessening, competition in a market, or (b) it involves any of some restrictive horizontal (price or purchase or selling fixing; dividing markets by allocating customers, suppliers, territories, collusive tendering). Section 4(2) sets out a rebuttable p …

The prohibition

Section 4(1) of the Competition Act prohibits a horizontal agreement or concerted practice if (a) it has the effect of substantially preventing, or lessening, competition in a market, or (b) it involves any of some restrictive horizontal (price or purchase or selling fixing; dividing markets by allocating customers, suppliers, territories, collusive tendering). Section 4(2) sets out a rebuttable presumption of the existence of an agreement to engage in a restrictive horizontal practice if any one of those firms owns a significant interest in the other, or they have at least one director or substantial shareholder in common, and any combination of those firms engages in that restrictive horizontal practice. Section 4(1) of the Competition Act does not apply to intra-group agreements (Section 4(5)).

As for the exchange of competitively sensitive information, the Competition Commission published Guidelines on 24 Febaruary 2023.

Section 5(1) of the Competition Act prohibits vertical agreements which have the effect of substantially preventing or lessening competition in a market, unless a party to the agreement can prove that any technological, efficiency or other pro-competitive gain resulting from that agreement outweighs that effect. Section 5(2) prohibits per se the practice of minimum resale price maintenance, without prejudice to the possibility for the supplier to recommend a minimum resale price to the reseller provided the supplier or producer makes it clear to the reseller that the recommendation is not binding, the product has its price stated on it, and the words “recommended price” appear next to the stated price (Section 5(3)).

Section 10 of the Competition Act confers the power on the Commission to grant an individual exemption to undertakings requesting it. The possibility of exemption concerns all agreements or practices covered by Chapter 2 of the Competition Act. Pursuant to the 2018 Competition Amendment Act, an exemption may be granted if the agreement or practice is found to contribute to maintenance or promotion of exports, promotion of the effective entry into, participation in or expansion within a market by small and medium businesses, or undertakings controlled or owned by historically disadvantaged persons, changing the productive capacity to stop decline in an industry or maintaining economic stability in an industry designated by the Minister. In addition, exemptions may be granted for an agreement or practice that relates to the exercise of a right acquired or protected in terms of specific legislation, such as intellectual property legislation, as stipulated in Section 10(4) of the Act. The exemption is awarded at the end of a procedure giving rise to a publication on which third parties are invited to make comments and after review by the Competition Commission.

Following the 2018 amendments, exemption must be granted or refused within one year of the receipt of the application (new Section 10(2A)). In addition, the Minister of Trade and Industry is now entitled, after consultation with the Competition Commission, to issue regulations exempting a category of agreements or practices from the application of Chapter 2 (new Section 10(10)).

Global Competition Law

1245. The prohibition

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Les notions juridiques connexes

1245. The prohibition

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Les notions juridiques connexes

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au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise