Assessment of economic effects from the UPC - Sunrise merger

Assessment of the effects from the merger between Sunrise and UPC on competition, including analysis of coordinated and non-coordinated effects.

Client

Sunrise

Project period

2018 – 2019

Related expertise

Competition Economics, Telecommunications and Post, Data Science

Team

Samuel Rutz, Michael Funk, Matthias Hafner, Tobias Binz, Christian Jaag

Contact

Samuel Rutz, Matthias Hafner

Project description

On September 23, 2019, the Swiss Competition Commission (WEKO) approved the planned merger between Sunrise and Liberty Global without any conditions or requirements after an in-depth review. Swiss Economics closely supported the process from the very beginning from an economic perspective.

According to WEKO, the planned merger does not create or strengthen a dominant market position in any of the analyzed markets. On the contrary, WEKO expects the acquisition to stimulate competition.

Swiss Economics worked closely with Meyerlustenberger Lachenal AG (MLL) throughout the entire process. MLL advised and represented Sunrise in this procedure from the very beginning. Among other tasks, Swiss Economics handled the data, contributed economic analyses at all stages of the process, and prepared several short expert reports.

Methods

Data preparation for the parties' submissions to WEKO
Competition economics analyses:
- Market delineation
- Assessment of potential collective market dominance
- GIS analyses to determine the "footprint" of the parties
- Temporal price comparisons and developments
- "Closeness of Competition"-analyses
- etc.
Review and validation of WEKO’s empirical analyses
Assessment of conditions and requirements