The Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission announced plans Thursday to host a series of listening forums. The events will allow officials to hear from those who have experienced firsthand the effects of mergers and acquisitions.
Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter of the Antitrust Division and FTC Chair Lina M. Khan will host four virtual forums over the next three months. DOJ and FTC plan to hear from the healthcare industry April 14 at 2 p.m. ET. to learn whether and how mergers may reduce competition. Seventy percent of healthcare executives expect mergers and acquisitions activity to rise this year.
“Recent evidence indicates that many industries across the economy are becoming more concentrated and less competitive — imperiling choice and economic gains for consumers, workers, entrepreneurs and small businesses. These problems are likely to persist or worsen due to an ongoing merger surge that has more than doubled merger filings from 2020 to 2021,” according to the Justice Department.
The listening forums will be open to the public, webcast on the FTC’s website, transcribed, posted online and included as part of the public record.
Kanter and Khan will attend each listening forum along with staff from their respective agencies. After industry speakers’ remarks, members of the public will be invited to voice their comments by registering online ahead of time.
The listening forums are intended to supplement the agencies’ recent request for comments on merger enforcement guidelines to ensure that the agencies hear from affected groups who might not otherwise participate in the process, they said. In addition to the round of listening forums, the DOJ and FTC plan to hold a spring enforcers summit April 4 that will include conversations about merger enforcement as well as discussions on how to work with industry regulators as part of a whole-of-government approach to competition policy.
