Dr. Gürkaynak heads the competition law and regulatory department of ELIG Gürkaynak Attorneys-at-Law. He has unparalleled experience in Turkish competition law counselling issues with more than 25 years of competition law experience, starting with the establishment of the Turkish Competition Authority. Every year, Dr. Gürkaynak represents multinational companies and large domestic clients in more than 35 written and oral defences in investigations of the Turkish Competition Authority, about 15 antitrust appeal cases in the high administrative court and over 85 merger clearances of the Turkish Competition Authority, in addition to coordinating various worldwide merger notifications, drafting non-compete agreements and clauses and preparing hundreds of legal memoranda concerning a wide array of Turkish and European Commission competition law topics.

In addition to his continuing private practice as an attorney primarily through ELIG Gürkaynak Attorneys-at-Law in Istanbul, Dr. Gürkaynak is an Honorary Professor of Practice at UCL Faculty of Laws in London. He also teaches competition law at Bilkent University Faculty of Law in Ankara since 2005, and he has taught competition law in more than 10 universities in Turkiye, in the European Union, in the United Kingdom and in the United States in the past 18 years. Dr. Gürkaynak is also a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Law, Economics and Society at UCL Faculty of Laws in London. He frequently speaks at international conferences and symposia on competition law matters. He has published five books and more than 80 academic articles in peer-reviewed international law journals.

Ms. Diane P. Wood received her BA in 1971 and her JD in 1975 from the University of Texas at Austin. After graduation, she clerked for Judge Irving L. Goldberg of the Fifth Circuit and for Justice Harry A. Blackmun of the US Supreme Court. She then worked briefly for the US State Department on international investment, antitrust, and transfer of technology issues. Moving on to Covington & Burling, Ms. Wood continued a more general antitrust and commercial litigation practice until June 1980. From 1980 to 1981, she was an assistant professor at the Georgetown University Law Center. In 1981, she joined the faculty of the Law School. She spent 1985 to 1986 on leave as a Visiting Professor at Cornell Law School, and she was on leave during the fall quarter 1986, while she worked on the project to revise the Department of Justice Antitrust Guide for International Operations. She served as Associate Dean from 1989 through 1992. From 1993 until 1995, she was deputy assistant general in the Antitrust Division of the US Department of Justice with responsibility for the Division’s International, Appellate, and Legal Policy matters. Before becoming a judge of the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in 1995, Ms. Wood was the Harold J. and Marion F. Green Professor of International Legal Studies.

Ms. Wood’s research interests include antitrust (both international and general), federal civil procedure, and international trade and business. She has taught in all three fields.

During his long career as a public official, Mr. Madero held numerous senior positions. He got his first managerial tasks in 1995 when he was appointed head of a state aid unit in charge of manufacturing sectors. In 1999 he became head of an antitrust unit dealing with cases relating to information, communication and media where paradigmatic investigations and decisions were instructed and adopted, with him as case manager. In 2007 he was appointed as director of information, communication and media until 2011. From 2011 to 2019, he was deputy-director general for antitrust and cartels. He was appointed deputy director-general of mergers in 2019, position that he retained until October 2020, that he retired from the Commission. Between those times he was acting director general of DG COMP.

Mr. Madero’s career at the Commission began when he joined DG Competition in 1987. There, he accrued valuable experience in leading global regulatory and antitrust work, some of which are now recognized as landmark policy decisions and cases for competition law.

Prior to joining the European Commission, he worked at Banco Bilbao in Spain for five years.

Mr. Madero is a graduate of the Complutense University in Madrid where he studied law. He has Diplomas in European Studies delivered by the Spanish Diplomatic School and the University of Grenoble, France.