On December 1, 2008, Dunlop Oil & Marine Ltd (“Dunlop”), located in Grimsby, England, pled guilty to rigging bids, fixing prices and allocating market shares of marine hose sold in the United States. Dunlop also agreed to pay a $4.54 million criminal fine and cooperate with the DOJ’s ongoing antitrust investigation.Marine hose is a flexible…
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On November 25, 2008, the FTC moved to block a merger between CCC Information Systems Inc (“CCC”), a subsidiary of CCC Holdings Inc., and Mitchell International Inc (“Mitchell”), owned by Aurora Equity Fund III LP.Both companies provide services in estimatics, electronic systems used to estimate the cost of collision repairs, and total loss valuation (“TLV”)…
Continue reading ›On November 19, 2008, Assistant Attorney General Thomas, Barnett of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division resigned. Under Mr. Barnett, the Antitrust Division acquired $1.8 billion in criminal fines against 50 corporations and 91 individuals. The Division was also responsible for 34 cases in which it filed to either block a transaction due to anticompetitive…
Continue reading ›On November 18, 2008, UK’s Office of Fair Trading (“OFT”) cleared InBev N.V/S.A.’s (“InBev”) $52 billion acquisition of Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc. (“Anheuser”). The new company, Anheuser-Busch InBev, will own InBev’s Stella Artois and Beck’s lager brands and Anheuser’s Budweiser lager brand.The transaction cleared the OFT without any conditions, even though the newly merged company would…
Continue reading ›One November 17, 2008, Andrew Barmakian, the former president of a California-based marine products company, pled guilty and agreed to serve a sentence and pay a criminal fine for his role in a conspiracy to rig bids for contracts for marine products purchased by the U.S. Navy, the U.S. Coast Guard, and other private companies.Mr.…
Continue reading ›On November 14, 2008, the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) required Inbev N.V./S.A. (“Inbev”) to divest its subsidiary Labatt USA (“Labatt”) in order for Inbev’s $52 billion acquisition of Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc (“Anheuser-Busch”) to proceed. Along with the divestiture, Inbev must sell its license to brew, market, promote, and sell the Labatt brand of beer for…
Continue reading ›On November 14, the DOJ allowed InBev N.V./S.A. (“InBev”) to acquire Anheuser-Busch Companies, Inc. (“Anheuser-Busch”) on the condition that InBev divest Labatt USA.The DOJ was concerned that without the divestiture of Labatt USA, the merger was likely to lessen competition substantially in the market for beer in the metropolitan areas of Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse,…
Continue reading ›On November 12, 2008, LG Display Co. Ltd. (“LG”), Sharp Corp. (“Sharp”), and Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd. (“Chunghwa”) pled guilty for their role in a conspiracy to fix prices for liquid crystal display (“LCD”) panels and agreed to pay criminal fines totaling $585 million.LCD panels are used in computer monitors, notebooks, televisions, mobile phones, and…
Continue reading ›On November 10, 2008, Val M. Northcutt, an executive at Manuli Rubber Industries SpA (“Manuli”) and Francesco Scaglia, , an Italian National employed as a product manager for marine hoses for Manuli’s factory, were each found not guilty by a twelve member jury sitting in the United States District Court for the Southern District of…
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