NEWS ARCHIVE

July 1, 2009
Criterion Consultant Awarded Fulbright

Criterion consultant Stephanie Hausladen was awarded a Fulbright to teach English in the Republic of Moldova in Eastern Europe. She will begin the program this fall. Ms. Hausladen works on antitrust, intellectual property, public utility, and international trade cases. She is a graduate of Stanford University. The Fulbright Program is the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government. Learn more here: http://fulbright.state.gov/

May 1, 2009
Criterion Awards First Annual Fellowship

Criterion Economics has awarded Princeton University junior Miguel W. Garrido the first annual Criterion Fellowship in Economics. The purpose of the fellowship is to recognize the top research paper by a junior economics major at Princeton University, with aspirations for a career in economics and public policy.

Mr. Garrido, who hails from Sarasota, Florida, currently works as a research assistant for Professor Sam Schulhofer-Wohl in Princeton’s Economics Department.

Mr. Garrido’s junior paper, “Does the Party Affiliation of a County Sheriff Influence His or Her Management of Law and Order?,” found that the office of county sheriff in Florida is a highly politicized institution. The study concludes that there are substantial differences in the effects of party affiliation on criminal prosecutions, racial patterns in arrests for particular crimes, expenditures, resource allocation, and overall efficiency in fighting crime.

Mr. Garrido will receive a cash prize and join Criterion as a Fellow this summer.

Criterion is based in Washington, D.C. and supplies law firms and corporations throughout the world with expert economic and financial analysis for complex legal disputes and public policy debates.

March 26, 2009
Sidak Testifies in ABA Mock Trial

Criterion Chairman and internationally-recognized economist J. Gregory Sidak testified today in the ABA 57th Antitrust Law Spring Meeting Mock Trial: Relevant Market in a Hypothetical Satellite Radio Merger.

Mr. Sidak has testified as an expert witness in scores of proceedings before courts, regulatory commissions, international commercial arbitration panels, and committees of Congress. Most recently, he submitted expert declarations to the Federal Communications Commission on behalf of the Consumer Coalition for Competition in Satellite Radio concerning the competitive consequences of the proposed merger of Sirius Satellite Radio, Inc. and XM Satellite Radio, Inc.

March 11, 2009
Sidak Offers Insight on Antitrust Matters in Merck Merger

Criterion Chairman and internationally-recognized economist J. Gregory Sidak was quoted today in Law360 discussing Merck & Co.'s plan to merge with Schering-Plough Corp. Please click here to read more.

February 26, 2009
Supreme Court Embraces Sidak Recommendation to Abolish Price Squeeze
 
The Supreme Court issued its decision Wednesday in Pacific Bell Telephone Company v. linkLine Communications, eliminating “price squeeze” as a viable antitrust theory under section 2 of the Sherman Act when a defendant has no antitrust duty to deal with the plaintiff at wholesale.
 
Criterion Chairman J. Gregory Sidak filed an amicus brief in the case with Judge Robert H. Bork, formerly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, on behalf of professors and scholars in law and economics in support of the petitioners (Pacific Bell, d/b/a AT&T California).
 
Mr. Sidak, a lawyer and economist who specializes in antitrust litigation, said today in Competition Law 360: “The Supreme Court’s decision makes clear that it is not possible to advance consumer welfare with an antitrust rule that punishes a firm for failing to ensure its competitors’ profitability.”

Mr. Sidak also noted:

The linkLine decision, though no surprise to antitrust specialists, is nonetheless important for four reasons:

• It sets the foundation for the Court to take a tie-in case and abolish whatever remains of the per se rule of illegality.
  
  
• It similarly sets the foundation for the Court to analyze the far more challenging case of bundled discounts.
  
  
• In this first antitrust decision in the Obama administration, we witness the conservatives and liberals on the Court splitting 5-4 on whether a losing plaintiff in an antitrust case should be tossed out of court entirely or have more bites at the apple on remand under different theories of liability.
  
  
• Fourth, on antitrust matters the Atlantic just got wider. The Supreme Court’s ruling directly conflicts with Europe’s recent prosecutions of price squeezes by Deutsche Telekom in Germany and Telefonica in Spain.

In addition, Mr. Sidak said: The Court, in a footnote, respectfully laid to rest the analysis of price squeezes in Judge Learned Hand’s Alcoa decision. Alcoa is effectively overruled, with no further explanation given by the Court than the statement that “developments in economic theory and antitrust jurisprudence since Alcoa’ make the ‘recent decisions in Trinko and Brooke Group more pertinent to the question before us.”

Contact Mr. Sidak at jgsidak@criterioneconomics.com.

December 4, 2008
George Mason Law Review 12th Annual Symposium on Antitrust Law: Antitrust Policy in the New Administration

The George Mason Law Review, together with sponsors WilmerHale and Criterion Economics, held the 12th Annual Symposium on Antitrust Law, on December 4, 2008, at the Ronald Reagan Building & International Trade Center in Washington, D.C. The symposium brought together distinguished enforcement officials, lawyers, academics, economists and corporate executives to discuss the forefront issues in competition law and policy. 

The focus was "Antitrust Policy in the New Administration." Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit gave the opening keynote address.

Professor Einer Elhauge of Harvard Law School, an adviser to the Obama compaign, presented a new approach to applying the rule of reason.

The luncheon address was by Professor Robert Pitofsky of Georgetown University Law Center, who formerly served as Chairman of the Federal Trade Commission during the Clinton administration. The closing address was by the FTC's current Chairman, William E. Kovacic.

Among the other speakers and panelists, Criterion chairman Gregory Sidak urged the Antitrust Division and the FTC to revisit the Merger Guidelines early in the Obama administration to take into account more explicitly considerations of dynamic competition and innovation. Chairman Kovacic's remarks echoed the need to revisit the Guidelines. Gregory Werden of the Antitrust Division, however, disputed the need the rewrite the Merger Guidelines.

To learn more about the conference, please click here.