News-Archive

Amazon has announced that it will be changing its business terms and conditions for retailers operating on its online marketplace worldwide. In return, the German Federal Cartel Office (FCO) [Bundeskartellamt] will close its proceedings for abuse of a dominant market position.

Read more

In the second quarter of 2019, the ECJ’s decision of 14 May 2019 (docket No. C-55/18) obligating member states to have employers implement an effective and accessible working time recording system with which the working time actually worked by employees could be measured daily, objectively and reliably, caused considerable uproar in the media.

Read more

On May 08, 2019, the German Federal Ministry of Finance (Bundesfinanzministerium) presented the draft of the "Act on the Further Tax Stimulation of Electric Mobility and the Amendment of Further Tax Regulations". This draft now regulates, among other things, the tightening of legislation in connection with real estate transfer tax (RETT) for so-called Share Deals, i.e. share transfers involving companies owning real estate, which was already discussed at state level in June 2018.

Read more

Almost unnoticed by traders and consumers, the new Geoblocking Regulation came into force in December, which largely prohibits a differentiation according to nationality and place of residence for online purchases. In future, traders will no longer be allowed to simply block or redirect customers from other EU countries.

Read more

In a recently published judgement dated 20 December 2018 (17 Sa 11/18), the Higher Regional Court [Landesarbeitsgericht, LAG] of Baden-Württemberg commented in the context of an unfair dismissal case on the scope of the right to inspect files under employment law and right to the disclosure of information under data protection law. This gave rise to several recommendations for dealing with the disclosure claim under data protection law as well as for the implementation of whistleblower systems and internal investigations.

Read more

The first quarter of the new year 2019 is drawing to a close and the employment courts are producing a steady flow of practice-relevant decisions. Hardly any other field of law is ‘tweaked’ on almost a daily basis in such a way as employment law. For company personnel work, therefore, it is essential to be aware and keep abreast of the developments in employment law jurisprudence. Only in this way can a legally sound organisation and management of the work performance of innumerable employees be achieved. The legislator is far less active when it comes to setting the course of employment law. Nevertheless, even the Federal Government consistently sets strong accents, currently with its considerations on the "Home Office Act" [Home-Office-Gesetz]. We will report on this as soon as a draft bill becomes available. At the moment, drafts of the Act on the Immigration of Skilled Workers [Fachkräfteeinwanderungsgesetz] and the Act against Illegal Employment and Social Benefit Fraud [Gesetz gegen illegale Beschäftigung und Sozialleistungsmissbrauch] are already available and are presented by us below.

Read more

German court decisions on issues relevant to private equity (“PE”) transactions are traditionally rare. A recently published decision of the Stuttgart Regional Court on leaver-clauses used in management participation agreements is noteworthy.

Read more

The German Federal Cartel Office, “FCO” [Bundeskartellamt, BKartA] has prohibited Facebook to combine user data from different sources without seeking explicit user consent. In this way it wishes to achieve an “internal unbundling” of the databases. In future, Facebook may no longer require its German users to generally consent to the practically unlimited collection and allocation of data to their user account. This is the first decision which establishes a breach of antitrust law on grounds of an infringement of data protection law. Despite the fact that the decision is based on German antitrust law, it may possibly have established a precedence beyond German borders. Below, we provide you with a more detailed description of the essential features of the decision, as seen from the perspective of our antitrust law and data protection experts.

Read more

Following a short break, we would now like to present you with our latest ITC Newsletter. The primary reason for this break was the many cases we have been dealing with on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). We have all survived the introduction of the GDPR on 25 May 2018 and the world did not stop turning (does anyone remember the Y2K problem?). However, several things have indeed changed; data protection is being taken seriously at all levels. We therefore decided to use our first Newsletter in 2019 to inform you about the various developments connected with the GDPR. By the way, we will be back next week with a newsflash explaining the decision by the German Federal Competition Authority [Bundeskartellamt] against Facebook to “internally unbundle” various data sets.

Read more

In December, the Hamburg office of the independent German commercial law firm Oppenhoff & Partner moved into its new office premises in HafenCity: Am Sandtorkai 74 – directly opposite the Elbphilharmonie. From here, a team now comprising seven lawyers advises the firm’s clients in and from the region of northern Germany.

Read more