Current Working Groups

Advocacy

Competition advocacy – competition agencies’ activities that address existing and proposed disproportionate public restrictions on competition and build public support for competition and markets – is an important part of our work. Recognizing its importance, one of the ICN’s first initiatives was the establishment of the Advocacy Working Group (AWG).

Agency Effectiveness

Effectiveness of the competition agencies is the primary focus of the Agency Effectiveness Working Group, which was previously named as Competition Policy Implementation Working Group. It aims to focus on various aspects contributing to efficient and effective enforcement of competition rules such as institutional and operational characteristics of competition agencies and to enable exchange of experience among the ICN members.

Cartel

The battle against hardcore cartels directed at price-fixing, bid-rigging, market sharing and market allocations is at the heart of antitrust enforcement.

As markets are increasingly global, competition authorities are faced with cartel activity that is, likewise, increasingly cross-border.

Therefore, ICN members at the ICN's 2004 Third ICN Annual Conference in Seoul resolved to set up a Cartel Working Group.  To address the challenges of anti-cartel enforcement, both domestically and internationally, across the entire range of ICN members and amongst agencies with differing levels of experience.

Merger

The Merger Working Group was established in 2001, as one of ICN's first initiatives. The Working Group promotes the adoption of best practices in the design and operation of merger review regimes to enhance the effectiveness of each jurisdiction's merger review mechanisms. The Working Group has developed recommended practices and practical guidance for the design and operation of merger review systems across issues of merger notification, investigation and analysis.

Unilateral Conduct

The ICN Unilateral Conduct Working Group was established in May 2006, at the fifth Annual ICN Conference in Cape Town. Its primary objectives are to examine the challenges involved in addressing anticompetitive unilateral conduct of dominant firms and firms with market power, and to promote greater convergence and sound enforcement of laws governing unilateral conduct.