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Competition and Cartel Investigations

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Companies need to be alive to the possibility of investigations and fines for anti-competitive behaviour. We defend our clients in cartel and other regulatory investigations. We defend their interests in subsequent or stand-alone court proceedings. We approach investigations and dawn raids with acuity, considering the best options to meet our clients’ objectives – whether through a strong defence or other means, including settlement and leniency applications. We have substantial recent experience of CMA and European Commission investigations for main parties. We also act for interested third parties.

We work with our own in-house CMS Evidence team of forensic experts using the market-leading software, Brainspace. This expertise, combined with our UK competition bench strength across London, Edinburgh and Brussels, complemented by our wider international competition teams,  allows us to manage large-scale document reviews efficiently and effectively.

Highlights of our experience in Investigations & Raids in the UK
Highlights of our experience:A multi-national pharmaceutical client on a dawn raid as part of the European Commission’s pharmaceutical sector inquiry.A major construction group on a dawn raid, leniency...
Law-Now: Investigations & Raids
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04/08/2023
Star Sports fined for AML and social responsibility failures
Star Racing Limited, trading as Star Sports, (“Star Sports”) has been issued an official warning, a £594,000 financial penalty and had additional conditions attached to its operating licence by the...
24/05/2023
Operator that runs 10bet.co.uk reaches regulatory settlement with the Gambling...
On 23 February 2023, the UK Gambling Commission (the “Com­mis­sion”) announced that enforcement action against Blue Star Planet Limited (“Blue Star”), trading as 10Bet, concluded in the payment...
27/01/2023
HMRC reverse position on collecting customer IP data from financial institutions
On 26 January 2023, the first report on HMRC’s use of financial institution notices (“FINs”) was laid before Parliament. The report includes a number of important updates, including an unexpected...
01/08/2022
Russia sanctions update: UK bans new investment into Russia
New UK sanctions regulations have come into force imposing the most rigorous restriction on doing business with Russia since the invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022. The twelfth amendment to the Russia...
24/06/2022
Regulation on foreign subsidies is heading for the finish line - European...
Since 5 May 2022, EU trilogue negotiations have been underway on the first Regulation to limit the effect of subsidies from third countries to companies active in the EU. That an agreement will be reached...
27/02/2022
Handling the new EU and UK sanctions against Russia
Since 2014, the EU and the UK have progressively imposed sanctions on Russia in response to the crisis in Ukraine. Following the latest events, both the EU and the UK, as well as many other countries...
21/12/2021
Watch On-Demand - Managing Investigations Video Series: Dawn Raids
Our latest video in the Managing Investigations: Planning, Pressures and Pitfalls series is now available to watch on-demand on cms.law. In this video exploring Dawn Raids, we provide tips to prepare...
25/11/2021
Challenging HMRC: making appeals out of time
In S De Silva v HMRC [2021] UKUT 275 (TCC), the Upper Tribunal (UT) refused the taxpayer’s application for permission to make late income tax appeals, even though the grounds of appeal were potentially...
11/10/2021
Corporate Bribery: a significant conviction 
Summary The “Failure to Prevent Bribery” offence, under Section 7 of the Bribery Act 2010 (the “BA”) makes corporates automatically liable for bribery committed by agents or employees, whether...
02/08/2021
Ofgem consults on proposed changes to enforcement procedure
On 9 June 2021, Ofgem published a consultation (the “Con­sulta­tion”) proposing a range of modifications to its Enforcement Guidelines (the “Guidelines”) and statement of policy with respect to...
29/07/2021
SFO secures two further DPAs for UK Bribery Act offences
On 19 July 2021, Mrs Justice May approved two deferred prosecution agreements (“DPAs”) between the Serious Fraud Office (“SFO”) and two unnamed UK limited companies. These DPAs come hot on the...
17/06/2021
Watch On-Demand - Managing Investigations Video Series: Health & Safety...
Our latest video in the Managing Investigations: Planning, Pressures and Pitfalls series is now available to watch on-demand on cms.law. In this video on Health & Safety and Environmental In­vest­ig­a­tions...