The Role of the Antitrust Lawyer

In a general sense, the role of the antitrust lawyer is like the role of the lawyer in any area to protect his client and further his clients interests. In the antitrust context, however, this frequently requires more than just defending a case, responding to a government investigation or shepherding a transaction through the merger review process. Frequently, representing a client in an antitrust matter requires modifying or defending fundamental aspects of the clients business model. This is a role that lawyers in other areas of practice rarely face. For antitrust lawyers it is fairly common. For example, antitrust issues regularly arise in connection with the methods by which firms distribute, sell and price their products, bundle their products for sale, license their technology, and interact with their competitors . The resolution of these issues requires that the antitrust lawyer develop a real understanding of how the clients business works and be able to work with the client in fashioning antitrust solutions for the clients antitrust problems that protect its business model and make commercial sense.

The antitrust lawyer has an additional obligation that is also rarely found in other substantive areas of legal practice. As mentioned earlier, the antitrust laws protect clients from the anticompetitive conduct of others. The antitrust laws thus always provide a business client with protections as well as obligations. Helping a client understand that antitrust may be a useful tool (or weapon) in dealing with competitive problems is a crucial aspect of the antitrust lawyers role. For business clients used to dealing with government law enforcement matters from the standpoint of responding to a government inquiry or plaintiffs complaint, the notion that antitrust can be a useful tool in pursuing ones business strategy may be new and in some cases surprising. It is essential that the antitrust lawyer make his client aware of this other and potentially powerful side of antitrust.

Given these somewhat unusual roles played by antitrust counsel, it is vital that the antitrust lawyer develop a real understanding of his clients business. The best antitrust lawyers understand their clients businesses well enough that they can help craft antitrust solutions that not only provide antitrust protection or solve antitrust problems, but that also make business sense. For antitrust lawyers, more than those in other areas of the law, truly understanding the clients business and what works and does not work for the client is vitally important. Lawyers who can combine their legal skills with an understanding of what the client needs to do to make his business work effectively, and the creativity to craft solutions that meet both antitrust and business requirements, can do their clients a real and meaningful service.

For the antitrust lawyer, there are two great rewards in practicing antitrust law. The first is that it is rarely boring. Almost every new client offers the opportunity to explore a new and different business and industry. Depending on its business, almost every new clients assignment offers a chance to see different parts of the economy and how they work. No two businesses are the same and no two industries work the same way. For the antitrust lawyer, it is challenging and occasionally fascinating to try to figure out how an industry works and why it works in one way as opposed to another.

The antitrust lawyers second reward is that antitrust matters. At the end of the day, our free market economy works the way it does in great part because the fundamental rules for that economy are set in the antitrust laws. Few other lawyers can say that their daily work involves interpreting and applying our the Magna Carta of free enterprise.