The Centre regularly conducts conferences on emerging areas of law and policy. The purpose of holding these discussions is to build a body of knowledge and generate consensus between different stakeholders on varying issues. The Centre has played a key role in formulating the current structure of competition law, consumer jurisprudence and technology policy in jurisdictions like India, Brazil, the EU and the US.

The details of some of the conferences organised by the Centre include:

1. Competitive of the AI Industry in India

Background of the conference

The advent of GenAI took most of the world by surprise. Though propelled by the advent of ChatGPT, Big Tech entities were soon to follow the trend by making strategic investments in the existing AI companies and simultaneously enhancing the expenditure to build the core infrastructural inputs required to be in this market. The market is currently in a nascent phase where there are a lot of uncertainties related to the future. The paper is an attempt to understand AI on its own merits and map the subsequent competition landscape around it. The paper also conducts a literature review of most of the leading competition authorities who have conducted similar studies across the world.

The YouTube feed of the conference could be accessed here.

2. Amnesty scheme under competition law

Background of the conference

The draft regulations have been published by the Indian Competition Commission in the backdrop of the Competition (Amendment) Act, 2023. One of the substantive changes brought forth by the amendment is the introduction of the commitment & settlement scheme in the Indian competition law. Another change is the introduction of 'leniency-plus' regime where an entity may inform the competition commission about additional cartels in specific markets. The draft regulations can be accessed here.

The YouTube feed of the conference could be accessed here.

3. Competition Landscape in Advertisement Technology ('AdTech')

Background of the conference

Advertisement Technology (AdTech) is an indispensable component of the digital markets. It has led to a complete overhaul of the system where the publishers and advertisers are governed by the terms issued by the intermediaries. Given the market structure, competition authorities across the globe have opened multiple investigations against select tech companies to look into various allegations as raised by the publishers for violating competition law.

The conference was hosted in physical mode.

4. CARCIL National conference on antitrust laws

Background of the conference

The Competition Act, 2002 is proposed to be amended through the Competition Amendment Bill, 2023. Some of the major provisions of the amendment include introduction of commitment and settlement scheme, change in the definition of 'relevant market', introduction of time frame for receipt of information and deal value threshold (DVT). The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance further proposed to enact a separate legislation to regulate competition in digital markets through its report on an ex-ante basis.

The conference was hosted by CARCIL Chanakya NLU, Patna in physical mode.

5. Competition in Digital markets

Background of the conference

The US House Judiciary Committee conducted hearing to scrutinize the alleged anti-competitive conduct of some of the biggest tech firms known as Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple. The hearing was conducted amidst intense scrutiny conducted by competition authorities across the globe, including the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Department of Justice (DOJ), to look into various business practices in an attempt to monopolize the market.

The YouTube feed of the conference could be accessed here.