Bundeskartellamt celebrates 60th Anniversary with festive ceremony

22.02.2018

Today the Bundeskartellamt celebrates its 60th Anniversary with a festive ceremony to be held in Bonn. On 1 January 1958 the German Act against Restraints of Competition (GWB) came into force and the Bundeskartellamt, then still in Berlin, began its work with 53 staff. Around 500 guests are invited to participate in today's ceremony in the former plenary hall of the German Bundestag at the World Conference Center Bonn. These will include representatives from politics, international competition authorities, the courts, the business sector and academia.

Andreas Mundt, President of the Bundeskartellamt: "In the last 60 years the Bundeskartellamt has undergone constant change, progressively refining its toolbox to protect competition. In 1958 the Bundeskartellamt took up the prosecution of cartels and abuse of market power. Since 1973 it has also examined mergers. In 1999 it gained competences in the area of public procurement law. Since 2017 the authority can also carry out sector inquiries into consumer protection issues. The Bundeskartellamt has always proved to be a very agile authority which is able to overcome even great changes."

The speakers at this event will be Brigitte Zypries, Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Energy, Bettina Limperg, President of the German Federal Court of Justice, and Professor Dieter Kempf, President of the Federation of German Industries (BDI).

In a double interview with the Director-General for Competition of the European Commission, Johannes Laitenberger, and the President of the Bundeskartellamt, Andreas Mundt, the publisher of the German daily FAZ, Holger Steltzner, will discuss the topic: "Competition, consumers, jobs – Who or what do competition authorities protect?"

This will be followed later by a panel discussion moderated by the Vice President of the Bundeskartellamt, Professor Konrad Ost, on the theme: "Competition policy in a globalized and digitalized world – Challenges of today and tomorrow"“. The panelists will be Makan Delrahim, Assistant Attorney General at the Antitrust Division of the United States Department of Justice, Dr Frank Montag, Chairman of the Competition Lawyers' Association, Isabelle de Silva, President of the French Autorité de la concurrence, and Professor Achim Wambach, Chairman of the Monopolies Commission.

You will find further information on the Bundeskartellamt's history in the authority's press release of 2 January 2018.

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