‘To date in practice victims of EC antitrust infringements only rarely obtain reparation of the harm suffered. The amount of compensation that these victims are forgoing is in the range of several billion euros a year.’1
Sadly enough, companies and consumers each year loose billions of Euros as a result of antitrust infringements, mostly by large companies. These infringements may vary from price fixing to market sharing cartels and abuse of a dominant position. This money is essentially stolen from the companies and consumers concerned. It will therefore come as no surprise that various countries impose criminal sanctions on breaking the antitrust laws. But many companies and consumers suffering from antitrust violations don’t know that they can also file a private antitrust damages action in court. This is called private enforcement of antitrust law, as opposed to public enforcement (enforcement of competition law through state organs as the national competition authority or the European Commission or, in the USA, the FTC and the Department of Justice).
Our mission is to help filling the gap in private enforcement and to assist companies that suffered damages resulting from antitrust infringements in obtaining reparation, either through litigation or through negotiation.
1This an official quote from the introduction to the European Commission’s 1998 White paper on damages actions for breach of the antitrust rules.