Navigating The New Competition Act: Early Impacts And Emerging Challenges (Podcast)

Key takeaways

• The amendments to the Competition Act result in increased scrutiny of transactions, requiring early-on proactive measures from merging parties.
• The new civil commercial agreements provision can be enforced by either the Bureau or private parties, but its scope remains uncertain.
• While private party applications to the Competition Tribunal have been limited, the first decision on the expanded public interest test for leave is pending.

Transformative amendments to the Competition Act have been in force for just over a year and we are already seeing their impact in several areas. Transactions are being subjected to heightened scrutiny, requiring a proactive approach from merging parties. At the same time, the expanded civil commercial agreements provision creates new uncertainty that we hope will be addressed in final enforcement guidelines and shaped by litigation in the coming years. The impact of the expanded private enforcement rights