Mr. Batchelor regularly represents clients on EU and global merger control matters and litigation, and provides counsel on distribution and collaboration agreements in complex and highly regulated industries, such as health care, financial services, insurance, media and entertainment, and gambling, among others.

Mr. Batchelor has spent time working in Brussels, London and Washington, D.C., as well as at EU and U.K. competition authorities. He has been recognized as a leader in his field in publications such as Chambers Global, Chambers Europe, IFLR1000 and The Legal 500, as well as Benchmark Litigation, in which he was named a 2021 Litigation Star for Belgium - EU Competition.

Among his recent experience, Mr. Batchelor has:

• represented Zuber and Mohsin Issa, owners of EG Group, and TDR Capital LLP in their acquisition of a majority stake in ASDA Group Limited from Walmart Inc.;
• represented Gilead Sciences, Inc. in its US$5.1 billion transaction with Galapagos NV. This transaction was named M&A Deal of the Year at the IFRL1000 Europe 2020 Awards;
• represented Dyson before the EU courts challenging labeling regulations favoring competing vacuum cleaners. This case was named an Impact Case of the Year at the Benchmark Litigation 2020 Europe Awards;
• advised on merger control and joint ventures in relation to the BP/Nova styrenics joint venture (for BP); Cisco/WebEx (for Cisco); Bain/American-Standard (for American Standard); OTPP/Camelot (for OTPP); Canal+/TVN (for Canal+); Warner Bros./Eyeworks (for Warner Bros.); and ADM/Wilmar (for ADM);
• annulled a cartel decision and fines of €519 million involving the synthetic rubber cartel; annulled a €119 million fine involving the GIS cartel;
• secured one of the lowest negotiated settlements in the seven-year-long DRAM investigation, halving the fine in the Windows Mountings case based on financial distress;
• secured immunity or substantial leniency discounts in the pipe fittings, citric acid and sodium gluconate cartels;
• settled the investigation of a large multinational bank in the EU Belgian banks cartel investigation;
• settled the 9/11 aviation insurance cartel inquiry on behalf of a major reinsurer;
• represented a pharmaceutical company before the General Court in an alleged “reverse payment” settlement agreement; and
• represented KirchMedia (now Infront), and subsequently FIFA, before the EU courts reversing EU decisions mandating free-to-air coverage of the FIFA World Cup.

Silke Hossenfelder, economist, has started working with the Bundeskartellamt in 1992 and is today heading the General Policy Division of the German Competition Authority, advising the Decision Divisions, representing the Bundeskartellamt within international organizations and being involved in competition law (and related) reforms at national and European level.

She has chaired several Decision Divisions within the Bundeskartellamt for over 10 years, where she handled a large variety of competition cases. Her international experience is based on participating in setting up the European Competition Network and joining the Netherlands Competition Authority during its first two years of activity.

David is a Director in the competition practice, and has worked with Frontier Economics since 2005 – dividing his time between its London and Brussels offices.

He regularly advises clients on competition issues in front of the European Commission, as well as handling merger, antitrust and competition litigation cases in front of national regulatory authorities and courts. He has particular expertise in Telecoms, Media and Technology, in FMCG and retail, and in public markets and the healthcare sector.

He is listed as Thought Leader in Who’s Who Legal for competition economics, and has published in the Competition Law Journal. He sits on the Editorial Board of the LexisNexis Competition PSL publication, for which he has authored a number of articles on the application of EU Competition Law.