International Conference “The Implementation of Competition Law: Tendencies and Practice”

On 10th of September 2014, the 11th international Baltic Sea Region conference “The Implementation of Competition Law:  Tendencies and Practice” was held in Vilnius.

The main presentation, “Application of Competition Law: Recent Trends”, was given at the conference by Richard Whish, Professor emeritus of the King’s College London, royal advisor, author of books and articles on competition law. Presentations were also given by John Davies, head of the Competition Division of the European Organization for Co-operation and Development (OECD), Dr. Ioannis Kokkoris, head of Legal and Economic Programme at the Faculty of Law of University of Reading and an executive director of the Centre for Commercial Law and Financial Regulation (CCLFR), Dr. Philip Marsden, director of the Competition Law Forum (UK) and a vice-chairman of the Advisory Board of the UK Competition and Market Authority (CMA), Nils von Hinten-Reed, the managing Partner of the CEG Europe and economic expert, Gintarė Surblytė, research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Innovation and Competition, Göran Karreskog, head of the Cartels and Mergers Department of the Swedish Competition Authority, and Dr. Lauras Butkevičius, associate professor of the Faculty of Law of Vilnius University and Lawyer.

Representatives of the competition authorities of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany and the Nordic countries also took part in the event. They together with law practitioners and academic community members discussed issues related to:

• Economic analysis of vertical agreements
• The application of competition law in the era of prosperity of online commerce
• Involvement of related enterprises in public procurement

The international Baltic Sea Region conference is organised each year in different country. In 2013 the conference was held in Estonia. In 2014 the conference was organised by the Competition Council of the Republic of Lithuania together with Faculty of Law of Vilnius University.