Dear ICN community,
Welcome to the second ICN quarterly update of 2010, which provides you with a brief overview of the ICN activity over the last months. I am also pleased to invite all NGAs to attend a conference call on 3 September to give their views on the future direction of the ICN: the details are provided below.
Annual Conference
The 9th annual ICN conference took place in Istanbul on 27-29 April 2010. Thanks to the dedication and vision of its host, the Turkish Competition Authority, the conference has been a resounding success. The topics discussed during the three-day meeting included the interface between competition policy and other public policies, recent trends and achievements of anti-cartel enforcement policy, the role given to third parties in merger proceedings, competition advocacy, market studies and strategic planning. You can consult online the summary of the work product discussed during the conference here.
The next ICN Annual Conference, hosted by the Dutch Competition Authority (the NMa), will be held in The Hague on 17-20 May 2011. You can find early bird information on this forthcoming event on the conference website here.
ICN Working Groups and Workshops
The first ICN Workshop of the 2010-11 ICN year was held in London on 12-13 July 2010. It was hosted by the Office of Fair Trading and co-organized with the Chairs of the Agency Effectiveness Working Group, the Turkish Competition Authority and Brazil’s CADE. It led to very fruitful and lively discussions among the 45 ICN member agencies represented, regarding topics such as knowledge and staff management and agency culture. As a follow up to this workshop, the Working Group will continue with the drafting of its manual, finalising the chapter on Effective Project Delivery and devoting a new chapter of this manual to “Knowledge Management”.
The Advocacy Working Group’s work plan is currently ‘road testing’ the draft Market Studies Good Practice Handbook and finalising the Market Studies Information Store (i.e. an online resource of market studies conducted by ICN member agencies within the last five years). The Working Group welcomes any expressions of interest from ICN members in taking part in the road testing. All comments can be sent here. They particularly invite ICN member agencies that are planning to carry out market studies or set up or review market study regimes during 2010-2011, to test the Draft Handbook by referring to it in that context, and to suggest any necessary revisions in the light of their practical experience. The Working Group will also create a posting section on the ICN website for advocacy activities, as well as update the 2004 Toolkit for Effective Advocacy.
The Legal Framework Subgroup of the Cartel Working Group plans to launch an experience sharing project on cartel awareness and outreach programs, including developing communication techniques to give businesses the tools to detect cartels, as well as to raise awareness of anti-cartel enforcement. This project will include partnership initiative with government, commercial procurement officials, the business community and the private bar. Any sharing of experience and input from ICN members and NGAs, for instance on public messages or material used in outreach efforts regarding cartels, is most welcomed. In addition, the organisation of the 2010 ICN Cartel Workshop is on good track thanks to the involvement of the Japan Fair Trade Commission, that will host it on 5-7 October in Yokohama, Japan. Its agenda will be built along the main theme: “making the best use of agency resources for cartel enforcement”. You can find all relevant information on the workshop on its dedicated website here, including a registration section here, which is open until 10 September 2010 if you wish to attend. The enforcement techniques subgroup also intends to draft a new chapter for the Anti-Cartel Enforcement Manual on case resolution.
The Merger Working Group’s work plan calls for a comprehensive assessment of its existing work product and membership needs in order to identify priority work for the future. All members are encouraged to participate in this assessment and contribute to the future direction of ICN’s merger work, by giving their thoughts on what merger issues deserve a closer look in the ICN agenda. A survey will be shortly circulated and its results discussed at the 2010 ICN Merger Workshop, which will be held in Rome on 3-4 November 2010 and be graciously hosted by the Italian Competition Authority (AGCM). Any enquiries regarding the ICN Merger Workshop can be sent here.
The Unilateral Conduct Working Group will begin a ‘workbook’ on the analysis of unilateral conduct, as well as continuing to hold teleseminars and webinars to share views on important unilateral conduct topics and recent cases. The last 2010 ICN Workshop, focusing on unilateral conduct, will be hosted by the European Commission (DG Comp) on 2-3 December 2010 in Brussels, Belgium. You can already access online preliminary insights concerning its organization here.
Consulting on the ICN’s future
As the tenth anniversary of the Network is approaching, a new project, “Planning for ICN’s Second Decade”, was launched at the ICN Annual Conference in Istanbul, to determine where the ICN stands and in which direction it should go in the forthcoming years, including identifying its main successes and challenges. A large consultation process has been initiated, beginning with surveys and interviews of all ICN member agencies. More than 70 competition agencies have been polled to date, but this is still an ongoing process and all members are invited to give their feedback and come up with fresh new ideas to strengthen the Network. The questionnaire is available online here.
A critical part of this process is getting input from our NGAs. As John Fingleton mentioned in his recent letter, we are planning to hold a conference call to collect NGA input. To avoid clashing with too many summer holidays, the call will take place on 3 September 2010 at 8am Washington time / 2pm Brussels time / 9pm Tokyo time. The dial-in details are as follows:
US / Canada Dial-in #: (866) 209-6102
International / Local Dial-in #: +1 (763) 416-8544
Conference ID: 91244349
In advance of the call, we will ask you complete a short (approximately 5 minutes), survey that will help us focus the 3 September discussion. We will send you a link to the survey next week, and hope you will be able to complete it before the end of August.
In the future, if you prefer not to receive these updates, please send an email here with the word “unsubscribe” in the subject line.
Best regards,
Bruno Lasserre
President of the Autorité de la concurrence
NGA Liaison