5 September agenda: "Standards and Competition"

Good morning IWABG members,

We have an agenda item for our upcoming 5 September meeting, so we will be
restarting Improving Web Advertising Business Group meetings after a delay.
Please post any suggested future agenda items to this list, or you can
contact me directly if you are interested in finding out if an agenda item
is on topic for the group.

Note: This is a special meeting that will include policy and legal content.
As a business group member you are able to invite guests. This is an
opportunity to share with policy and legal stakeholders at your company.

Don


Agenda item follows...

Subject: Standards and Competition – What you need to know to stay safe

Date: 5th September – 4PM BST (UK time)

This presentation combines engineering and legal expertise to explain the
practical actions IWA BG participants need to take to stay safe when
engaging in technical standards. Topics covered include:

- Introduction and brief background on Movement for an Open Web.
- Competition law as applicable to standards bodies:
    o Why standards bodies have antitrust guidelines.
    o Difference between standards bodies and other types of organizations.
    o What antitrust guidelines need to cover.
    o Enforcement of antitrust guidelines.
    o Examples of violations and what to do when you observe them.
    o Risks of non-compliance.

- Current competition landscape in US, Europe, and UK:
    o Standards bodies are involved and need to be more proactive.

If you have ever typed or said IANAL (I Am Not a Lawyer) then the session
is for you. The session is targeted at business managers, lawyers, and
engineers involved in standards settings. The presentation will be recorded
and last 40 minutes. Some voluntary audience participation will be
encouraged.

The following Q&A session will not be recorded as per the established
practice of the IWA BG.


Presenters:

Tim Cowen is Chair of the Antitrust Practice at Preiskel&Co and is
independently recognised as one of the leading competition/regulatory
lawyers in the EU. He leads the competition law team at Preiskel&Co where
his practice covers a full range of competition law and regulatory matters
arising across the Tech, Media and Telecoms sector. Tim led BT’s
competition law and public policy team for many years. He led the team
advocating liberalisation of the EU market and the system of law that
promotes competition among telecommunication and technology companies. From
a deep understanding of the reasons for the law he now spends about half of
his time on policy and the reasons either for reform or reinforcement of
the system. In this regard he co-chairs the Digital Policy Alliance
Competition Group
with Lord Clement Jones.

Tim has dealt with many abuse of dominance cases and anti-competitive
practices both for
defendants and plaintiffs. For example, in 2009 he left BT to join Sidley
Austin and help Microsoft with deal with the EU commission and compliance
with the Commission and Court decisions. He currently represents a range of
companies in the EU Commission’s ongoing investigations of Google’s abuse
of dominance in online search and the bundling of applications with the
Android operating system; for which the Commission has imposed record
fines. He has dealt with almost every type of case in telecoms and
competition law – advising on the application of the law and leading
transactions and litigation. For example, he has acted on all major merger
cases affecting the sector – either for parties to transactions or third
parties affected by them. Recent cases include Tobii / Smartbox,
TCB/Quidco, as well as representing players in the leading cases such as
WhatsApp/Facebook and Google/DoubleClick, AT&T/ T Mobile, BT/EE and
H3G/O2. Current and past positions include:  Founder of Movement for an
Open Web, and the Open Computing Alliance, Board Member of the
International Institute of Communications, Board Member Bingham Centre for
the Rule of Law, Founder member Competition Law Forum British Institute of
International and Comparative Law, Chairman, Armitt Museum, Past Member of
the Competition
Appeal Tribunal, Past Chairman, Competition Panel, Confederation of British
Industry and Past Chairman, International Association of Commercial and
Contract Management. He was awarded the title of ‘Distinguished Visiting
Fellow’ at the European Business School in London and is currently a guest
lecturer for the law faculty at Oxford. He was appointed as a Visiting
Professor at the City of London Law School, and has lectured at Imperial
and Queen Mary Colleges in London. He is a Barrister and holds an MA
(Cantab) in law.

James Rosewell
James Rosewell is CEO of 51Degrees, a B2B (aka third-party) data,
opensource, and service provider. He combines 31 years of experience in
business, law, and engineering to solve complex problems. Together with Tim
he founded Movement for an Open Web.