At the end of August, 2012, the Competition Board issued a notice declaring its intention to raise the merger notification thresholds, less than two years after the commencement of the new thresholds regime, and requested all interested parties to submit their opinions. This reasoning is said to increase the efficiency of the merger supervision process by decreasing the number of filings, and by increasing the ratio of the transactions in the total number of notifications that cause competitive concern. Historically, the antitrust experts perceive the merger control procedure as a less efficient way of antitrust enforcement, and would be happy to exclusively concentrate on crashing cartels. This perception is to be clearly identified in the notice of the TCA – hence, another move to put resources after cartels.
A wider look at the puzzle of the TCA’s moves reveals that the TCA is drawing resources from activities that are considered to be less vital, in order to concentrate on cartel enforcement in Turkey in the years ahead. The bottom line is that it is a better time than ever to conduct an antitrust compliance check, and to consider the merits and demerits of a leniency application.
About the author:
Suleyman Cengiz is the in-house competition counsel of Herguner Bilgen Özeke. Mr. Cengiz rendered service to the Turkish Competition Authority as an Antitrust Expert & Case Handler for more than 13 years. Along his career he worked on numerous antitrust and merger & acquisition cases especially in banking and insurance, transportation and transportation infrastructure, health and service industries. Mr. Cengiz also holds a Master on International Economic Relations from Konstanz University, Germany and currently working on his Business Administration PhD.
Hergüner Bilgen Özeke Attorney Partnership
Süleyman Seba Cad., Siraevler 55, Akaretler
34357 Besiktas-Istanbul, Turkey
Tel: (90) 212 310 18 00
Fax: (90) 212 310 18 99
E-mail: www.info@herguner.av.tr
Website: www.herguner.av.tr
