SANTA CLARA, Calif., Feb. 20, 2019—Many of Silicon Valley’s leading tech and other companies regularly risk running afoul of antitrust laws— be it by using their troves of customer data to preclude competition; illegally colluding with competitors not to poach one another’s employees (which has already resulted in high-profile criminal charges and settlements); or not knowing how and when platforms can make deals discouraging certain forms of payment.
These and other issues will be the topic of an all-day symposium sponsored by the Santa Clara University Law School and the California Bar Association’s Section on Antitrust Law. The symposium, Antitrust and Silicon Valley: New Themes and Directions in Competition Law and Policy, will be held March 1 from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. at Charney Hall of Law on Santa Clara’s campus, 500 El Camino Real, Santa Clara, CA 95053.
The symposium will feature presentations by leading antitrust lawyers, state and federal antitrust enforcement attorneys and antitrust law scholars from throughout the United States. Michael Murray, the deputy assistant attorney general of the U.S. Department of Justice, will give a keynote talk on labor antitrust initiatives, and Daniel Wall of Latham and Watkins will be the lunchtime keynote speaker, and will provide a comprehensive historical look at antitrust litigation in Silicon Valley.
Panels throughout the day will touch on antitrust hot-button issues. including the no-poach agreements that ensnared numerous tech giants; price-fixing and monopoly issues; and antitrust implications of intellectual property rights.
The symposium also will feature a screening of a new short documentary film When Rules Don’t Apply, about DOJ’s criminal antitrust case against Valley tech giants who entered into agreements to suppress wages and hiring for each others’ engineers and animators. The film’s director and advisers will participate in a discussion thereafter.
Who: Students, scholars, professors, lawmakers, regulators and practitioners in antitrust law
What: All-day symposium: Antitrust and Silicon Valley: New Themes and Directions in Competition Law and Policy
When: March 1, 8:00 a.m. to 6 p.m.
Where: Charney Hall, Santa Clara University campus, 500 El Camino Real, Santa Clara, Calif. 95053
The program qualifies for up to 7.75 hours of MCLE credit for attorneys (1.5 hours of ethics credit) and will include materials, breakfast, lunch and a reception at the conclusion.
Contacts: Event Contact: Professor Donald Polden at 408 554 4768 or dpolden@scu.edu
Media Contact: Deborah Lohse 408-554-5121 or dlohse@scu.edu
