Competition Law Overview of the Competition Law in various jurisdictions with special reference to hot topics

Atsushi Yamada is a partner at the Tokyo office of Anderson Mori & Tomotsune focusing on competition/antitrust law. His practice covers all aspects of competition/antitrust law including assisting clients in investigations by competition authorities (cartels/dominance/unfair trade practices), representation in courts/tribunals challenging decisions made by competition authorities, follow-on civil litigation, and merger filings. He also provides advice relating to structuring new businesses and establishing compliance programs.

Prior to joining Anderson Mori & Tomotsune, he has worked at the Tokyo office of a US law firm and a local Japanese firm after serving as a judge at the Tokyo District Court as well as other courts. With such background, he has extensive experience in litigation and general corporate matters. He also serves as an adjunct lecturer for antitrust law at Hitotsubashi University (School of Law), and has spoken at various international conferences/seminars including the ABA, IBA and ICN.

Atsushi Yamada is a graduate of the University of Tokyo (LLB, 1994) and Cornell Law School (LLM, 2003). He is admitted to the Bar in both Japan and New York.

Biography

Practice Area

• Competition
• Regulatory Compliance

Ms. Gong joined JunHe Beijing Office in May 2010. Before joining JunHe, she worked for MOFCOM (former agency responsible for merger control review) for nearly three years.

Ms. Gong has extensive experience in advising clients on all aspects of Chinese antitrust law, including merger control, administrative investigations, and antitrust compliance. She has advised clients in a broad range of industry sectors, including agriculture, automobiles, chemicals, consumer products and retail, energy and natural resources, healthcare, real estate, ports, semiconductor, and private equity.

Ms. Gong’s representative cases in merger control area include Broadcom’s acquisition of VMware (2023), Viterra’s acquisition of Gavilon’s grains and ingredients business (2022), INEOS’ various joint ventures in China (2021-2023), Applied Materials’ acquisition of Kokusai Electric (2019), Marriott’s acquisition of Starwood (2016), Dell’s acquisition of EMC (2016).

In addition to competition practice area, Ms. Gong has been advising clients in various industries in national security review area, including infrastructure, industrial software, high-tech, etc..

Marc Waha leads our Asia Antitrust and Competition Team. He is based in the Hong Kong and Tokyo offices of Norton Rose Fulbright.

Marc advises international companies on antitrust regimes in East Asia, and Asian companies on global competition compliance issues, multi-jurisdictional merger filings and international cartel investigations, particularly in Europe and Asia. For more than 20 years he has represented clients active in a wide variety of industrial and services sectors, with a focus on advising Asian companies on global antitrust and competition law matters.

Recent work highlights include:

• advising two airlines in respect of investigations by the Hong Kong and Malaysian competition authorities into their proposed joint venture arrangements;
• representing QatarEnergy in respect of Asian merger control clearances for eight parallel natural gas joint ventures with international energy companies;
• representing a leading US airline in respect of the expansion of its transpacific joint venture with a Korean airline following its merger with a rival Korean carrier;
• assisting the Net-Zero Insurance Alliance (NZIA) on the antitrust aspects of the United Nations Environment (UNEP) Programme’s Sustainable Finance Initiative;
• representing a third party in obtaining the imposition of remedies by Japan’s Fair Trade Commission in respect of Google’s acquisition of Fitbit (the authority’s first ex officio review of a foreign transaction as a “killer acquisition”);
• securing the end of an investigation by the Hong Kong Competition Commission into a ports terminal joint venture by way of commitments;
• assisting the operator of a digital marketplace in respect of an investigation by the competition authority in Singapore, with the authority deciding not to take action;
• securing unconditional clearances across Asia for the merger of the two largest airlines in Hong Kong.

Marc is the author of the first edition of the Hong Kong Competition Law Handbook (Butterworths). He also regularly publishes and speaks at conferences on competition law issues of relevance to Asia. He and the Asia Antitrust and Competition Team have been involved in training programmes for Asian competition authorities. Marc has been ranked as a leading lawyer in several guides over the years, including Chambers & Partners, Legal 500, Euromoney’s Guide to leading lawyers, the Guide to the World’s Leading Competition and Antitrust Lawyers, PLC’s Which Lawyer?, Asialaw’s Leading Lawyers, and The International Who’s Who of Competition Lawyers & Economists.

Marc is a member of the Bar in Brussels and New York. He is a registered foreign lawyer in Hong Kong and in Tokyo. He is a graduate of the University of Michigan Law School (LLM) and of the Free University of Brussels Law School (License).