First edition of the Three-Party Chats on Mergers: the Autorité takes into account the contributions received to its public consultation and announces concrete proposals
The first edition of the “Three-party Chats on Mergers” was held on 27 May at the Linklaters office in Paris, with students from the Business Law master’s (Competition and Distribution) at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University, under the direction of Professor Catherine Prieto.
The seminar brought together Jérôme Vidal, Head of the Mergers Unit, and Nicolas Zacharie, lawyer at Linklaters, to discuss “The status and role of the monitoring trustee in merger control”. A video replay of the discussion will soon be available on the Autorité website.
During the seminar, the Autorité de la concurrence announced that several requests made by respondents to the public consultation launched on 14 March 2025 could be implemented in the coming months, without any legislative changes to the texts in force:
- the possibility of appointing a monitoring trustee upon submission of the commitments;
- an explanation or reasons for a decision to refuse the approval of a monitoring trustee;
- the systematic organisation of a meeting, at the start of the monitoring of the commitments, with the approved monitoring trustee;
- a systematically formalised procedure for the discharge of the monitoring trustee at the end of its mandate;
- the creation of a dedicated page on the Autorité website, presenting the monitoring trustees.
The Autorité de la concurrence welcomes the high number of expressions of interest in the “Three-Party Chats on Mergers” – a new format of free, public seminars on merger control – received from higher education establishments and law and economics firms across France.
Given the many high-quality applications received, a selection process is underway to draw up the 2025-2026 calendar for the upcoming seminars. The goal of the selection process is to ensure a broad representation of students from as diverse educational backgrounds as possible, while taking into account the time and organisational constraints inherent to the work of the Mergers Unit and its case officers. The detailed programme for the seminars, which is currently being finalised, will be communicated at a later date. Successful candidates will be notified directly.
The Autorité is delighted the project has been so enthusiastically received and remains fully committed to supporting and enriching the dialogue around current issues in merger control, in close collaboration with academic and professional stakeholders in the field. The ongoing selection process is only a first step and the Autorité already looks forward to collaborating with the universities and firms not selected, during a future round of seminars.
For any new applications or for any further information on the “Three-Party Chats on Mergers’, please send an e-mail to: colloques.concentrations@autoritedelaconcurrence.fr