Innovationswettbewerb in der europäischen Fusionskontrolle

Innovation is the origin of technical and thus economic progress. It is regularly the upstream research and development activity that generates innovation. It is therefore important for competition authorities to include R&D in the competitive investigation and to consider the long-term effects of a merger on R&D in merger control. Given the particular predictive uncertainty of R&D and its great importance for technological and economic progress, the specific question arises as to how the Commission should consider R&D in merger control. This paper is intended to answer this question.