Stephen Smith

Practice Areas

With over 20 years’ experience, Stephen has a very broad practice with experience across a broad range of EU and UK competition law matters. His practice includes advising on the competition law aspects arising from distribution and other commercial agreements, to merger control (UK and multi-jurisdictional) as well as cartels and anti-trust investigations.

Another area of focus is advice in respect of the laws on abuse of dominance, both for companies who enjoy such positions of strength and for those who may be affected by an abuse of dominance.

Finally, Stephen has significant experience of competition litigation, from advising clients on judicial review of regulatory decisions, to advising in respect of follow-on and standalone competition litigation actions.

Some of Stephen’s recent experience includes:

- Advising Bestway on its acquisition of the UK pharmacy wholesale and retail business of Lexon, one of the fastest Phase 1 clearance decisions before the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).

- Advising Dutch listed home furnishings group Hunter Douglas in respect of the CMA’s Phase 1 and Phase 2 reviews of the completed acquisition of 247 Home Furnishings

- Acting for Eurotunnel’s MyFerryLink business, in the first ever jurisdictional challenge under the merger provisions of the Enterprise Act to reach the Supreme Court in the UK. The case encompassed two lengthy merger proceedings before the CMA, two appeals at the Competition Appeals Tribunal and one at the Court of Appeal before reaching the Supreme Court.

- Advising on the owners of the Evening Standard and the Independent in the Competition Appeals Tribunal on their successful jurisdictional challenge against the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Support.

- Advising national fibre network challenger CityFibre on various aspects of the regulatory fixed broadband network before Ofcom and on appeal at the Competition Appeals Tribunal

- Acted for Denon & Marantz on a European Commission investigation into resale price maintenance.

- Assisting an animal medicines manufacturer with the CMA’s market investigation into the veterinary sector

- Advising a UK housebuilder on various aspects of the CMA’s investigation into alleged information exchange in the UK housebuilding sector.

- Worked with numerous clients on the national security aspects of various deals under the UK National Security and Investments Act.

Stephen is recognised by his clients as adept at providing pragmatic, commercial advice and his experience spans diverse sectors including telecommunications and technology, life sciences, financial services, retail, manufacturing, and fmcg services generally.

Stephen is fluent in French and is a former Chair of the Law Society’s Competition Section.

Career

MA Modern and Medieval languages, University of Cambridge

Qualified 2001

Partner 2011

Joint Managing Partner 2022 – present

Advocaat bij de Balie te Brussel

Admitted in Republic of Ireland (non-practising)