United Kingdom: Antitrust/Competition Law

A year ago, few would have predicted the extent to which politics would have reshaped the antitrust regulatory landscape when it comes to merger control.

Welcome to the latest edition of our newsletter which explores recent competition law developments across the UK and EU.

In February 2026, the European Commission published the non-confidential version of its decision to conditionally approve Abu Dhabi National Oil Company’s (ADNOC) acquisition of Covestro AG (Covestro), shedding further light on its approach to enforcing the merger component of the Foreign Subsidies Regulation (FSR).

Global cartel fines totaled USD3.3 billion in 2025. This was a significant increase on 2024 (USD602.5 million) and 2023 (USD1.9bn) and represented the highest annual total since 2021 (USD4.0bn).

The report discusses the significant increase in fines, use and development of investigative tools, the impact of digital market scrutiny...

On 9 January 2026, the European Commission (Commission) published the long-awaited Guidelines on certain key substantive aspects...

Merger Control Comparative Guide for the jurisdiction of UK, check out our comparative guides section to compare across multiple countries

After 11.00pm on Brexit day (i.e. 29 March 2019 unless parliament and the EU decides otherwise), EU law will stop applying in the UK.

The High Court decision in Blade Motor Group Limited v Reynolds & Reynolds Limited in May this year, serves some useful lessons to software customers on the risks with being locked-in to a supplier relationship and locked out of accessing your data.