Cartel fine and administrative proceedings

We defend our clients in fine proceedings and administrative proceedings brought by the competition authorities, and also in any subsequent court proceedings. This includes strategic advice on their defence as well as advice on leniency programmes offered by the competition authorities. 

Preparing our clients for possible dawn raids is an integral part of our services. The CMS dawn raid network provides contact persons for the event of a surprise inspection in all major countries where our clients are located. 

To head off the possibility of an investigation by the competition authorities, we support many clients with strong market positions in identifying and eliminating competition law issues up front, thereby enabling them to focus on growth. Many leading companies rely on our expertise in this regard to advise them on their pricing, rebate, distribution and supply policies. 

The CMS team also advises clients on protecting their business interests against abusive conduct by their business partners, e.g. in cases of margin squeeze, refusal to supply, or unjustified claims. Our work here covers out-of-court advice, filing complaints with the competition authorities and initiating judicial proceedings.

Last but not least, we are familiar with more recent enforcement instruments such as the Federal Cartel Office’s competition register and we advise and support our clients with regard to submitting applica-tions for deregistration, for example.