‘Learning from each other’s experiences’ – a review of the ICN Merger Workshop on cross-border cooperation

CPI ICN Column edited by Maria Coppola (U.S. Federal Trade Commission)

‘Learning from each other’s experiences’ – a review of the ICN Merger Workshop on cross-border cooperation. – Alex Baker

‘Workshops of this kind will give us an immense opportunity to learn from each other’s experiences,’ the Hon. Arun Jaitley, Indian Finance Minister, remarked in his welcome address at the 2014 ICN Merger Workshop, which took place in Delhi in December and was hosted by the Competition Commission of India.

On the first day of the workshop delegates discussed their practical experience with cross-border co-operation – How does it work? What are the best practices? What sorts of problems do new agencies face, and how can outreach mitigate them? How should agencies approach information exchange in multi-jurisdictional filings?

The discussions recognized the potential costs to business of multi-jurisdictional reviews created, for example, by differences in merger review periods. There was general agreement that communication among agencies reviewing the same transaction can help reduce such costs. Co-operation among reviewing agencies may also help agencies better target their limited resources by sharing information about competitive concerns. However, there are some areas where increased co-operation may not always be desirable. For example, there may be transactions where agencies will only need very minimal contact to coordinate,