On July 1, 2021, the Competition Tribunal (the “Tribunal”) ruled that it does not have the power to issue “interim, interim orders” in the context of a proposed merger of two companies in the midstream infrastructure and environmental solutions space. Rather, the Tribunal found that, in the case of mergers, interim relief is limited to that expressly provided for by sections 100 and 104 of the Competition Act (the “Act”). Background On March 9, 2021, Secure Energy Services Inc. (“Secure”) and Tervita Corporation (“Tervita”) announced that they would be merging (the “Transaction”), and submitt ..read more

Double Ticketing Canadian competition law prohibits businesses putting two prices on one product and charging the higher of the two prices. This concept of double ticketing was first introduced into Canadian law in 1975 to address stores listing two different prices for a single item; however, we are now seeing the concept being extended to today’s digital marketplace. This trend commenced with the recent class action against Airbnb (2019 FC 1563) invoking section 54 of the Competition Act in the context of Airbnb showing a user one price for accommodation on the search results page, and a sec ..read more

The use of long-term exclusive lease agreements by supermarkets in South Africa has been quite controversial over the last few years.  Unsurprisingly, the impact of long-term exclusive lease agreements on local competition was one of the six objectives to be investigated by the Grocery Retail Market Inquiry[1] (“GRMI”) which was established on 30 October 2015. In the final report of the GRMI, which was published on 17 December 2019, it was recommended that the Competition Commission (“Commission”) must seek to secure voluntary compliance by the national supermarket cha ..read more

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted our lives in countless ways. For example, most of us are now working remotely for our home offices, living rooms or kitchen tables. In-person meetings have been replaced by video calls, email and texts. This is expected to continue for weeks – if not months – as governments at all levels are requesting that Canadians stay home in an attempt to “flatten the curve”. While statistics aren’t available, it’s reasonable to assume that the number of documents being created and retained by businesses has increased since the pandemic began. In many cases, these docum ..read more

On March 18, 2020, the Commissioner of Competition (the “Commissioner”) issued an open letter to the executive members of the Canadian Bar Association’s Competition Law Section regarding the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Competition Bureau’s (the “Bureau”) enforcement processes. In this letter, the Commissioner stated that “the Bureau may … need to prioritize urgent marketplace issues that require immediate action to protect Canadians”. While the Commissioner did not provide specific examples of “urgent market issues”, a subsequent statement issued by the Bureau suggests that these i ..read more

In response to the COVID-19 virus, Canada’s federal government has restricted non-essential travel and closed the US border. Canada’s provincial governments have enacted highly restrictive measures including mandating the closure of facilities providing recreational programs (i.e. gyms), libraries, public and private schools, licensed childcare centres, bars and restaurants, theaters, cinemas and concert venues, and the list goes on. Some provinces have also banned gatherings of more than 5 people and prohibited all non-essential businesses. The status quo is likely to continue for weeks, if ..read more

In the recent case of Computicket v the Competition Commission, the Competition Appeal Court was called upon to analyse and explain the standard that must be met to establish an exclusionary abuse of dominance under South Africa’s Competition Act. The case provides insight into important practical and policy questions – what do we mean by “anti-competitive effects” and how high is the hurdle that must be cleared to establish such effects? The case involved exclusivity provisions in agreements between Computicket (a firm found to be dominant in the market for outsourced ticketing distributing ..read more

The South African Grocery Retail Market Inquiry (“Inquiry”) published its preliminary report on May 29, 2019 (“Preliminary Report”). The broad finding of the Inquiry is that there is a combination of features in the South African grocery retail sector that may prevent, distort or restrict competition. For an overview of the key preliminary findings of the Inquiry, please see our bulletin, Grocery Retail Marketing Inquiry: Key Preliminary Findings and Recommendations. Stakeholders were invited to submit comments on the Preliminary Report by June 28, 2019 and the Inquiry is currently busy with f ..read more

Over the past week, the Commissioner of Competition has made a number of comments relevant to big tech companies and the digital economy. These comments were made on a panel at the Data Forum Discussing Competition Policy in the Digital Era in Ottawa on May 30th, at a conference hosted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in Paris on June 3rd and during an interview with CBC News. The key comments are summarized below. Competition Bureau to Monitor Acquisitions by Big Tech Companies As noted in our recent blog post titled “Competition Bureau Expands Merger Investigatio ..read more

Joint ventures are generally only of interest to competition authorities when they trigger merger notification obligations, or are otherwise used as a platform for collusive or anticompetitive behavior. Recently, the South African competition authorities’ interest has been peeked in joint ventures that have purportedly been used as a platform for cartel activity, and a number of decisions were handed down in 2018. This post answers a number of questions in light of these decisions, and highlights the implications of these decisions on future conduct by competitors looking to establish, or oper ..read more