We have represented several different governments, and in particular the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Australia, to present their respective concerns to the U.S. Supreme Court on the extraterritorial reach of U.S. law. The cases involved areas as diverse as securities, tort, and human rights litigation.
All three of the firm’s antitrust partners have been selected to help the governments in former communist countries establish antitrust laws and enforcement systems, as part of their efforts at economic liberalizations. The countries in which our lawyers have worked include Russia, Ukraine, China, Vietnam, and Mongolia. We have also assisted the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordon in considering consumer-oriented changes to its trade law.
In addition, one partner has been selected by the DOJ Antitrust Division and the FTC to be a Non-Government Advisor to the International Competition Network–which is heavily involved in promoting convergence of the world’s numerous, often newly established, competition enforcement agencies.
Both kinds of efforts give us a chance to better understand the priorities and thinking of the numerous antitrust agencies around the world.
It is important to generally understand the key differences between the U.S. litigation system and how litigation is handled in outside the U.S. to maximize opportunities and minimize risks for a client. Our relationships with judges, lawyers and scholars help keep us alert to different assumptions and processes which characterize non-U.S. tribunals and those who practice before them. Our experience in teaching international competition law underscores and supports our judgment in this area.
Arbitration of international disputes is an area where we have helped achieve some singular results for clients. We have coordinated one of our U.S. clients who was simultaneously engaged in overlapping licensing and antitrust disputes with a major non-U.S. competitor before (i) an international arbitration panel in Canada and (ii) a U.S. district court.
We have frequently advised (i) foreign clients on U.S. antitrust issues, and (ii) U.S. clients on the likely application of non-U.S. competition law. The subjects covered include mergers, licenses, joint ventures and antitrust compliance generally. Obviously, anticipation of likely governmental concerns in the U.S. and elsewhere and close cooperation with non-U.S. lawyers is critical here.
We have quite often been retained to investigate and defend overseas conduct on behalf of U.S. and international clients being investigated by multiple antitrust enforcement agencies. This has required careful coordination with in-house and non-U.S. counsel, to try to assure that a step taken in one jurisdiction did not prejudice the client’s interests in other jurisdictions.
Our lawyers have personally appeared in investigations undertaken by the European Commission, the Canadian Competition Bureau and Australia.
We have also offered expert testimony on U.S. law and history to the Israeli competition authority on behalf of a client being investigated in a merger case, to the EC on the analysis of joint ventures and to USTR on exclusionary conduct and jurisdiction.
