Articles Posted in Antitrust Litigation Highlights

On May 25, 2021, the D.C. Office of the Attorney General (DC AG) filed an antitrust complaint against Amazon.com, Inc. in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. The complaint accuses the company of monopolization and illegal restraints of trade. Interestingly, the complaint does not include allegations of federal antitrust violations. The complaint alleges…

McDonald’s arguments were limited because of past decision in Deslandes.  In Deslandes, the court held that the plaintiff employees plausibly alleged that the franchises’ no-poach restraints could be found unlawful under a quick-look analysis so McDonald’s did not move to dismiss for failure to state a claim.   The Northern District court rejected McDonald’s argument that…

On January, 17, 2020, smaller rivals such as PopSockets, Basecamp, Sonos, and Tile testified to the the House antitrust subcommittee about how they have been bullied by big tech giants such as Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon and called for swift action. According to the New York Times, the smaller rivals, which have largely been…

The federal antitrust agencies continue their emphasis on investigating, challenging, and unwinding consummated transactions that are not reportable under the Hart Scott Rodino (“HSR”) Act. Most recently, on November 6, 2019, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) issued an Opinion and Final Order in which the Commission upheld the Administrative Law Judge’s (“ALJ”) decision that Otto…

On September 12, 2019, a coalition of unions, consumer groups, and public interest organizations filed a letter with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) opposing AbbVie Inc.’s (“AbbVie”) acquisition of Allergan plc (“Allergan”). Coalition Opposing the Merger The coalition includes Families USA, Public Citizen, U.S. PIRG Education Fund, Service Employees International Union, American Federation of…

Commentators all over the spectrum have recognized antitrust is increasingly becoming a game of political football. The notion that antitrust enforcement is motivated by politics has hung over the Trump administration since the Department of Justice’s failed attempt to block AT&T’s acquisition of CNN’s owner, Time Warner and some antitrust experts might point out that…

On March 22, 2019, Judge John Michael Vazquez of the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey granted Allergan’s motion to dismiss Shire’s antitrust complaint that Allergan monopolized the Medicare Part D dry eye disease (“DED”) treatment market through its contracting practices with insurers including rebates based on a bundled portfolio of…

On September 5, 2018, Judge Trevor N. McFadden of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia granted the Federal Trade Commission’s request for a preliminary injunction preventing Tronox Ltd. (“Tronox”) from completing its proposed $2.4 billion acquisition of National Titanium Dioxide Company Ltd. (“Cristal”) until after a final ruling in the FTC’s…

On August 10, 2018, the Eastern District of Pennsylvania denied J&J’s motion to dismiss Pfizer’s antitrust action involving infliximab products. Background on Pfizer/J&J In September 2017, Pfizer filed an antitrust lawsuit under Sections 1 and 2 of Sherman Act alleging J&J engaged in exclusionary anticompetitive practices to keep Pfizer out of the market for infliximab…

On March 5, 2018, Sparton Corporation (“Sparton”) announced the termination by Sparton and Ultra Electronics Holdings plc (“Ultra”) of their July 7, 2017 merger agreement. According to Sparton, during the review of the proposed merger by the United States Department of Justice (“DOJ”), the United States Navy (“Navy”) expressed the view that instead of the parties…