July 2013 CPI Blog o’ Blogs

CPI
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July 2013, Volume 3, Number 7
Really active this month – Court decisions on reverse payments and eBooks, U.K.’s competition redesign, Becker & Posner on patent trolls, the destruction of Microsoft’s monopoly, municipalities’ lack of antitrust immunity, and a question: Are sports anti-doping rules an antitrust violation?
Reverse Payments

Opinion Recap: “Pay to Delay” in Deep Trouble
Although the new style of antitrust lawsuit that the decision will permit was not free from ambiguity, the majority opinion written by Justice Stephen G. Breyer made two things very clear.
Lyle Denniston (SCOTUSblog)
Not Going to Wait Anymore
The clear issue is that our patent system is spitting out patents that the courts don’t think should be issued.
Adam Miller (Upward Pricing Pressure)
Reverse Payments in EU and US Antitrust Law
Interestingly, the FTC wasn’t able to give a satisfactory answer to a very pertinent question asked by Justice Sotomayor at the hearing: “Why is the rule of reason so bad?”)
Alfonso Lamadrid (Chillin’ Competition)
Just What on Earth Did Actavis Really Say? And Does It Mean Something for Section 1 More Broadly?
It’s going to be a strict, nearly-per-se quick look rule, folks, in more or less every reverse-payment case likely to be brought from here on out. Dollars-to-donuts.
Christopher Sagers (Antitrust Connect Blog)

Becker and Posner on Patent Trolls

On Reforming the Patent System
The patent system as practiced in the United States is too broad, too loose, and too expensive.
Gary Becker (The Becker-Posner Blog)
Patent Trolls – Posner
It is extremely difficult to discern any possible social benefit from trolls, and extremely easy to discern substantial social costs.
Richard Posner (The Becker-Posner Blog)

The Apple eBook Decision

DOJ’s Victory Over Apple May Turn Out To Be A Pyrrhic One
And is the price of a product the only measure by which consumer welfare should be measured?
Michael Bobelian (Forbes)
Why I think the Apple eBooks Antitrust Decision Will (Or at Least Should) Be Overturned
I continue to believe that the facts of this case do not merit per se treatment, and there is a good chance the court’s opinion could be overturned on this ground.
Geoffrey Manne (Truth on the Market)

The U.K. Restructuring

Competition Policy as a Cattle Market
The CMA is treated as an arm of the state, or perhaps government, which has a role to perform in changing the way the economy works.
Cosmo Graham (Competition Law Blog)
The UK’s New Cartel Offence: It Could Be Alright on the Day
Indeed ignoring legal advice is arguably more clandestine than forming a cartel under the suspicion that it is illegal.
Andreas Stephan (CCP Competition Policy Blog)

Three for the Road

This Is Exactly How Fast the Windows Monopoly Is Being Destroyed
Microsoft’s “Windows monopoly” hasn’t been so much destroyed as rendered irrelevant.
Henry Blodget (Slate)
Privatized Regulation and Antitrust
Even though municipalities can be thought of as an unusual type of state agency, the Supreme Court has never authoritatively decided how to treat state agencies generally under antitrust law.
Sasha Volokh (The Volokh Conspiracy)
Cañas, anti-competitive doping rules and injury-curtailed careers
The substance of Mr Cañas’ complaint that anti-doping rules infringe competition law will not now be investigated further by the Commission.
Emily Neill (Sports Law Bulletin)
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