VILGERTS

Competition, Employment

Partner

Jūlija Jerņeva, LL.M. is an EU law, competition, employment and M&A attorney, practicing since 2003.

Jūlija Jerņeva main focus of work lies with competition law. Jūlija has unique expertise in the field of unfair trading practices in business-to-business relationships in the food supply chain. She has represented clients in mergers, abuse of dominant position and cartel matters, advised on dawn raids, market inquiries and investigations across various industry sectors. Jūlija has a long track record of representing clients in competition cases before the Latvian Competition Council and Latvian state courts. She also represented clients before the European Commission and the Court of Justice of the European Union.

Jūlija’s employment practice covers advising on collective consultation and redundancies, handling discrimination, mobbing, bossing, harassment and unfair dismissal claims. She represents  clients in both -  individual and collective disputes, before the courts and the State Employment Inspectorate. Jūlija  also consults companies on day-to-day matters, including overtime and rest period calculations, non-competition and confidentiality undertakings, as well as drafting tailor-made employment contracts and internal workplace rules.

Jūlija regularly participates in the work groups set up by the Latvian government or the Latvian Parliament (Saeima), lobbying the interests of clients in the context of proposed draft laws. Jūlija is also involved in a number of lobbying projects on pro bono basis.

Ms. Jerņeva has also been invited by the Constitutional Court of Latvia to provide a number of expert opinions on EU law matters.

Ms. Jerņeva currently researches loyalty inducing practices by dominant companies as part of her PhD. She also teaches EU competition law, EU Internal Market law and EU External relations in Riga Graduate School of Law. Jūlija has authored and co-authored numerous academic articles in the field of Latvian and EU competition law.

Latvian, English, Russian, Spanish

Latvian Bar Association (since 2003)

2015 / University of Latvia, PhD (expected) 2008 / King’s College London, Diploma in EU Competition law 2005 / College of Europe, Bruges, LL.M. 2004 / University of Latvia, Bac. iur.