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Geoffrey Manne was quoted in Deadline on the difference between the potential issues presented by a Comcast-Fox merger as opposed to a Disney-Fox Merger: The . . .
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in Deadline on the difference between the potential issues presented by a Comcast-Fox merger as opposed to a Disney-Fox Merger:
The opinion comes from Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law and Economics, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization. It can be seen as something of an early preview of how a Comcast bid might be positioned to regulators. The crux of Manne’s point in his report (read it here) is that Comcast-Fox would be a “vertical” merger, combining distribution and content assets. Disney-Fox, he maintains, would be a horizontal blending of content assets. “On its face, and consistent with the last quarter century of merger enforcement by the DOJ and FTC, the Comcast acquisition would be less likely to trigger antitrust scrutiny, and the Disney acquisition raises more straightforward antitrust issues,” Manne wrote. “This is true even in light of the fact that the DOJ decided to challenge the AT&T-Time Warner merger. The AT&T/TWX merger is a single data point in a long history of successful vertical mergers that attracted little scrutiny, and no litigation, by antitrust enforcers (although several have been approved subject to consent orders).”
The opinion comes from Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law and Economics, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization. It can be seen as something of an early preview of how a Comcast bid might be positioned to regulators. The crux of Manne’s point in his report (read it here) is that Comcast-Fox would be a “vertical” merger, combining distribution and content assets. Disney-Fox, he maintains, would be a horizontal blending of content assets.
“On its face, and consistent with the last quarter century of merger enforcement by the DOJ and FTC, the Comcast acquisition would be less likely to trigger antitrust scrutiny, and the Disney acquisition raises more straightforward antitrust issues,” Manne wrote. “This is true even in light of the fact that the DOJ decided to challenge the AT&T-Time Warner merger. The AT&T/TWX merger is a single data point in a long history of successful vertical mergers that attracted little scrutiny, and no litigation, by antitrust enforcers (although several have been approved subject to consent orders).”
Click here to read the full Deadline article.
Geoffrey Manne’s recent analysis on the Comcast/Fox merger was cited in an Ars Technica article: Owning RSNs lets Comcast set the price that cable, satellite, and . . .
Geoffrey Manne’s recent analysis on the Comcast/Fox merger was cited in an Ars Technica article:
Owning RSNs lets Comcast set the price that cable, satellite, and online TV services pay to air local sports games, because Comcast’s rivals have to buy those rights from Comcast. The other major benefit of owning RSNs is that Comcast’s cable TV service can broadcast games for local sports teams in many markets without having to pay another company for programming rights. This benefit won’t extend across Comcast’s footprint, however, because 14 of Fox’s 22 RSNs are in local markets where Comcast’s cable TV network doesn’t have a “substantial” presence, economist Geoffrey Manne wrote.
Click here to read the full Ars Technica article.
ICLE Scholar Professor Gus Hurwitz was interviewed in Pacific Standard about Wednesday’s Senate CRA resolution vote to undo the FCC’s Restoring Internet Freedom Order: On . . .
ICLE Scholar Professor Gus Hurwitz was interviewed in Pacific Standard about Wednesday’s Senate CRA resolution vote to undo the FCC’s Restoring Internet Freedom Order:
On Wednesday, Senate Democrats, joined by three Republicans and two Independents, voted to retain the 2015 net neutrality rules, according to Reuters. The vote is part of a legislative challenge to the new FCC regulations, made possible by the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to contest rules made by federal agencies. For Congress to prevent the net neutrality rule rollback, the House of Representatives will now have to pass the same resolution. The Republican-controlled House is unlikely to vote like the Senate on this issue, if they hold a vote at all. Additionally, a number of companies and 21 state attorneys general have brought legal challenges against the rule changes. The FCC voted to repeal net neutrality in December. Why has it taken so long to go into effect? After any piece of regulation gets voted on and adopted by a federal agency, it needs to go through a regulatory process, and it needs to be finalized and published in the Federal Register. And that process always takes a couple of months to get it to [the Office of Management and Budget] for a review, before it can be published in the Federal Register. And then it doesn’t go into effect for another month or so after it’s been published in the Federal Register. The thing that some folks have recognized and raised a little fuss about—though I think it’s really a tempest in a teapot—is some of the elements of the 2017 order could have gone immediately into effect, but the order said that they weren’t going to go into effect until the rest of the order (that did need to go through this longer process) went into effect. The reclassification, which is a declaratory order—that can be implemented immediately. But the new transparency rule needs to go through the OMB and Federal Register process. …
On Wednesday, Senate Democrats, joined by three Republicans and two Independents, voted to retain the 2015 net neutrality rules, according to Reuters. The vote is part of a legislative challenge to the new FCC regulations, made possible by the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to contest rules made by federal agencies. For Congress to prevent the net neutrality rule rollback, the House of Representatives will now have to pass the same resolution. The Republican-controlled House is unlikely to vote like the Senate on this issue, if they hold a vote at all. Additionally, a number of companies and 21 state attorneys general have brought legal challenges against the rule changes.
The FCC voted to repeal net neutrality in December. Why has it taken so long to go into effect?
After any piece of regulation gets voted on and adopted by a federal agency, it needs to go through a regulatory process, and it needs to be finalized and published in the Federal Register. And that process always takes a couple of months to get it to [the Office of Management and Budget] for a review, before it can be published in the Federal Register. And then it doesn’t go into effect for another month or so after it’s been published in the Federal Register.
The thing that some folks have recognized and raised a little fuss about—though I think it’s really a tempest in a teapot—is some of the elements of the 2017 order could have gone immediately into effect, but the order said that they weren’t going to go into effect until the rest of the order (that did need to go through this longer process) went into effect. The reclassification, which is a declaratory order—that can be implemented immediately. But the new transparency rule needs to go through the OMB and Federal Register process.
…
Click here to read the full Pacific Standard interview.
ICLE Scholar Professor Gus Hurwitz was quoted in MarketWatch on the T-Mobile/Sprint merger and the race for 5G: When previous wireless standards launched, the key . . .
ICLE Scholar Professor Gus Hurwitz was quoted in MarketWatch on the T-Mobile/Sprint merger and the race for 5G:
When previous wireless standards launched, the key advantage to being first was “mostly just bragging rights,” said Gus Hurwitz, a law professor at the University of Nebraska. With 5G, there’s more at stake. Hurwitz explained that 5G is being built to serve as a machine-to-machine data network that can enable new technologies in the Internet of Things ecosystem. There’s an advantage not necessarily to be first, but to being early, as a delay of six to nine months could result in “billions of dollars in diverted investments,” Hurwitz said. That’s likely a big reason why the government is playing 5G advancement as a national security concern. “If we’re not a leader in 5G, than the capital of U.S. firms is going to go toward building equipment that’s compliant with other companies and countries,” Hurwitz said. There’s debate among experts about whether Sprint S, -1.38% and T-Mobile are right in saying that they need to merge to be successful in 5G. Northeastern’s Chowdhury thinks there’s some truth to the statements. He told MarketWatch that the companies will likely be able to benefit from “dynamic spectrum access” and piece together “scraps of spectrum” from different points in the frequency scale. From a technological perspective, he thinks the merger seems smart because the costs of 5G deployment are significant and will require “a combination of finance and technology.”
When previous wireless standards launched, the key advantage to being first was “mostly just bragging rights,” said Gus Hurwitz, a law professor at the University of Nebraska. With 5G, there’s more at stake. Hurwitz explained that 5G is being built to serve as a machine-to-machine data network that can enable new technologies in the Internet of Things ecosystem. There’s an advantage not necessarily to be first, but to being early, as a delay of six to nine months could result in “billions of dollars in diverted investments,” Hurwitz said.
That’s likely a big reason why the government is playing 5G advancement as a national security concern. “If we’re not a leader in 5G, than the capital of U.S. firms is going to go toward building equipment that’s compliant with other companies and countries,” Hurwitz said.
There’s debate among experts about whether Sprint S, -1.38% and T-Mobile are right in saying that they need to merge to be successful in 5G.
Northeastern’s Chowdhury thinks there’s some truth to the statements. He told MarketWatch that the companies will likely be able to benefit from “dynamic spectrum access” and piece together “scraps of spectrum” from different points in the frequency scale. From a technological perspective, he thinks the merger seems smart because the costs of 5G deployment are significant and will require “a combination of finance and technology.”
Click here to read the full MarketWatch article.
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in the Irish Examiner on the costs associated with suing large companies like Google: If the internet’s potentates are frightened, however, they’re . . .
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in the Irish Examiner on the costs associated with suing large companies like Google:
If the internet’s potentates are frightened, however, they’re doing a good job of hiding it. Google has appealed the European Commission’s decision and has vigorously defended itself online. The company’s arguments are the same ones that it was putting forth on company blogs over the course of the investigation. “We disagree with the European Commission’s argument that our improved Google Shopping results are harming competition,” Google’s top lawyer wrote in one post. The commission “drew such a narrow definition around online shopping services that it even excluded services like Amazon,” undermining the contention that Google is dominant. “Google delivered more than 20bn free clicks to aggregators over the last decade,” he wrote in another post. Forcing it to “direct more clicks to price-comparison aggregators would just subsidize sites that have become less useful for consumers.” Google’s data indicates that users appreciate how the search engine has shifted over the years. “That’s not ‘favoring’” Google’s interests, the company said. “That’s giving customers and advertisers what they find most useful.” Some legal theorists think that Google might have a point. “To what extent are consumers, rather than competitors, being harmed by Google?” says Hovenkamp, the antitrust scholar. “If the answer is ‘not much,’ then I’m suspicious of an antitrust remedy.” Others say the risks are too high. “There are very real costs associated with suing a company like Google,” says Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a nonpartisan research center. “You’re potentially impairing a firm that provides vital services to millions of people, and potentially benefiting competitors who don’t deserve that support.”
If the internet’s potentates are frightened, however, they’re doing a good job of hiding it. Google has appealed the European Commission’s decision and has vigorously defended itself online. The company’s arguments are the same ones that it was putting forth on company blogs over the course of the investigation. “We disagree with the European Commission’s argument that our improved Google Shopping results are harming competition,” Google’s top lawyer wrote in one post. The commission “drew such a narrow definition around online shopping services that it even excluded services like Amazon,” undermining the contention that Google is dominant. “Google delivered more than 20bn free clicks to aggregators over the last decade,” he wrote in another post. Forcing it to “direct more clicks to price-comparison aggregators would just subsidize sites that have become less useful for consumers.” Google’s data indicates that users appreciate how the search engine has shifted over the years. “That’s not ‘favoring’” Google’s interests, the company said. “That’s giving customers and advertisers what they find most useful.”
Some legal theorists think that Google might have a point. “To what extent are consumers, rather than competitors, being harmed by Google?” says Hovenkamp, the antitrust scholar. “If the answer is ‘not much,’ then I’m suspicious of an antitrust remedy.” Others say the risks are too high. “There are very real costs associated with suing a company like Google,” says Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a nonpartisan research center. “You’re potentially impairing a firm that provides vital services to millions of people, and potentially benefiting competitors who don’t deserve that support.”
Click here to read the full Irish Examiner article.
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in Bloomberg Businessweek on the pending antitrust litigation against Google that AG Josh Hawley is pressing. Even though the suit itself . . .
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in Bloomberg Businessweek on the pending antitrust litigation against Google that AG Josh Hawley is pressing. Even though the suit itself is unlikely to resolve in Hawley’s favor, it could yet have longterm negative implications for Google:
No serious legal expert thinks Hawley and his modest team will be able to prosecute Google successfully on their own. But an antitrust lawsuit doesn’t have to be a winner to be damaging, says Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law and Economics, a nonprofit think tank. In addition to an FTC investigation, Microsoft Corp. faced a series of lawsuits brought by ambitious state attorneys general. A federal judge in 2000 ordered that the company be broken up, but it negotiated a settlement during the appeals process that required it merely to make its software development tools available to other businesses. Microsoft was eventually outmaneuvered in the online market by smaller companies—most notably Google and Facebook Inc., which came to dominate internet services and social media. Manne, who worked at Microsoft in the mid-2000s, attributes its fall from supremacy partly to a sense of caution that the company developed during its years of bruising litigation. “It doesn’t even matter if you’re found liable,” he says. “It can still have a big effect. If Google isn’t fearful, they should be.”
No serious legal expert thinks Hawley and his modest team will be able to prosecute Google successfully on their own. But an antitrust lawsuit doesn’t have to be a winner to be damaging, says Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law and Economics, a nonprofit think tank. In addition to an FTC investigation, Microsoft Corp. faced a series of lawsuits brought by ambitious state attorneys general. A federal judge in 2000 ordered that the company be broken up, but it negotiated a settlement during the appeals process that required it merely to make its software development tools available to other businesses.
Microsoft was eventually outmaneuvered in the online market by smaller companies—most notably Google and Facebook Inc., which came to dominate internet services and social media. Manne, who worked at Microsoft in the mid-2000s, attributes its fall from supremacy partly to a sense of caution that the company developed during its years of bruising litigation. “It doesn’t even matter if you’re found liable,” he says. “It can still have a big effect. If Google isn’t fearful, they should be.”
Click here to read the Bloomberg Businessweek article.
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in Fierce Healthcare on how the deal can be an experiment in the private sector for reform in the healthcare system: The . . .
Geoffrey Manne was quoted in Fierce Healthcare on how the deal can be an experiment in the private sector for reform in the healthcare system:
The American Medical Association raised similar concerns in written testimony (PDF) submitted before the hearing, saying the deal poses anticompetitive concerns “unique to vertical mergers,” as a new competitor would have to enter the market in both insurance and PBM to compete with the combined CVS-Aetna. “Close scrutiny is needed to determine if the ramifications of this massive merger will threaten the benefits of competition, including increased access and choice, lower prices and higher quality care for patients,” AMA President David O. Barbe, M.D., told FierceHealthcare in an emailed statement. Other experts at the hearing had a more positive outlook on the deal, however. Geoffrey Manne, the executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, said that the merger would allow the companies to greater innovate the stagnating healthcare space. The deal is an example of how the private sector can lead the way in shaking up healthcare, Manne said. “The overriding theme of my testimony is that the proposed merger is a commendable effort to experiment with substantial reform of what we can all agree is a beleaguered healthcare system,” he said.
The American Medical Association raised similar concerns in written testimony (PDF) submitted before the hearing, saying the deal poses anticompetitive concerns “unique to vertical mergers,” as a new competitor would have to enter the market in both insurance and PBM to compete with the combined CVS-Aetna.
“Close scrutiny is needed to determine if the ramifications of this massive merger will threaten the benefits of competition, including increased access and choice, lower prices and higher quality care for patients,” AMA President David O. Barbe, M.D., told FierceHealthcare in an emailed statement.
Other experts at the hearing had a more positive outlook on the deal, however. Geoffrey Manne, the executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, said that the merger would allow the companies to greater innovate the stagnating healthcare space. The deal is an example of how the private sector can lead the way in shaking up healthcare, Manne said.
“The overriding theme of my testimony is that the proposed merger is a commendable effort to experiment with substantial reform of what we can all agree is a beleaguered healthcare system,” he said.
Click here to read the Fierce Healthcare article.
Bloomberg Technology, reporting on a case in front of the Supreme Court that has large implications for antitrust law, quoted ICLE Executive Director Geoffrey Manne: . . .
Bloomberg Technology, reporting on a case in front of the Supreme Court that has large implications for antitrust law, quoted ICLE Executive Director Geoffrey Manne:
Two-sided markets are especially common on the internet. Facebook serves its free users and its advertisers; Uber Technologies Inc. balances the marketplace for drivers against one for riders. Any ruling setting aside special consideration for two-sided marketplaces would be a huge boon to Silicon Valley. Uber could, say, ban drivers from working with Lyft Inc., or Amazon could make sellers charge lower prices on its platform than anywhere else. Even the most extreme scenarios could be immune to antitrust complaints if the tech platforms could argue that benefits accrue to someone else, said Tim Wu, a professor at Columbia Law School. “Don’t you realize you’re insulating a whole class of business from the reach of the law?” he said. Not everyone thinks this would be a bad thing. Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a research group, acknowledged that the Supreme Court may make it harder to bring cases alleging anti-competitive behavior by tech companies. “But ‘harder to bring a case’ isn’t the right metric,” he said. “The right metric is, ‘Does it make it harder to bring a good case?’—not, ‘Does it make it easier to win a bad one?’”
Two-sided markets are especially common on the internet. Facebook serves its free users and its advertisers; Uber Technologies Inc. balances the marketplace for drivers against one for riders. Any ruling setting aside special consideration for two-sided marketplaces would be a huge boon to Silicon Valley. Uber could, say, ban drivers from working with Lyft Inc., or Amazon could make sellers charge lower prices on its platform than anywhere else.
Even the most extreme scenarios could be immune to antitrust complaints if the tech platforms could argue that benefits accrue to someone else, said Tim Wu, a professor at Columbia Law School. “Don’t you realize you’re insulating a whole class of business from the reach of the law?” he said.
Not everyone thinks this would be a bad thing. Geoffrey Manne, executive director of the International Center for Law & Economics, a research group, acknowledged that the Supreme Court may make it harder to bring cases alleging anti-competitive behavior by tech companies. “But ‘harder to bring a case’ isn’t the right metric,” he said. “The right metric is, ‘Does it make it harder to bring a good case?’—not, ‘Does it make it easier to win a bad one?’”
Read the full article.
IAPP, reporting on the likelihood of reversing the FCC’s repeal of Net Neutrality, quoted ICLE Executive Director Geoffrey Manne: But Geoffrey Manne, executive director at the International . . .
IAPP, reporting on the likelihood of reversing the FCC’s repeal of Net Neutrality, quoted ICLE Executive Director Geoffrey Manne:
But Geoffrey Manne, executive director at the International Center for Law and Economics, doesn’t see the regulatory scheme, as it technically exists now, as problematic. He thinks the FTC has plenty to go on. Largely because, even if the 9th Circuit court’s initial ruling were to stand, and common carriers were designated based on status and not activity, the ruling technically only applies to companies headquartered in the 9th Circuit. Plus, suing a company in court is only one of the FTC’s enforcement options. “The FTC has lots of mechanisms for getting around [the ruling], not the least of which being administrative adjudication,” Manne said. “I think far more likely is that it would have very limited effect beyond the 9th Circuit.” Alternatively, Manne said, what if the FTC simply decided it didn’t agree with the FCC’s terms? Who gets to decide who a common carrier is? “In the world in which Title II still applied,” he said, “we all act as if regulation by the FCC under Title II equals common carrier status under the FTC Act, but I don’t know that’s necessarily the case.”
But Geoffrey Manne, executive director at the International Center for Law and Economics, doesn’t see the regulatory scheme, as it technically exists now, as problematic. He thinks the FTC has plenty to go on. Largely because, even if the 9th Circuit court’s initial ruling were to stand, and common carriers were designated based on status and not activity, the ruling technically only applies to companies headquartered in the 9th Circuit. Plus, suing a company in court is only one of the FTC’s enforcement options.
“The FTC has lots of mechanisms for getting around [the ruling], not the least of which being administrative adjudication,” Manne said. “I think far more likely is that it would have very limited effect beyond the 9th Circuit.”
Alternatively, Manne said, what if the FTC simply decided it didn’t agree with the FCC’s terms? Who gets to decide who a common carrier is? “In the world in which Title II still applied,” he said, “we all act as if regulation by the FCC under Title II equals common carrier status under the FTC Act, but I don’t know that’s necessarily the case.”
