Many evidentiary challenges arise in establishing abuses of dominance. In order to establish a finding of dominance, competition authorities usually rely on indirect evidence such as market shares and barriers to entry. There is typically no single factor that leads to a finding of dominance, so it can be difficult to determine how much and what type of evidence is sufficient. Equally, the establishment of an abuse raises evidential complexities. The types of conduct that constitute an abuse can be difficult to establish and competition authorities face the difficult task of weighing evidence in support of an abuse against evidence suggesting that the conduct was a legitimate practice. An effects based approach will use economic methodologies to determine the abuse. The seminar will explore these issues through presentations by competition officials from OECD countries, case studies presented by the participants and hypothetical case studies. We will circulate a draft agenda in due course.

Invited will be participants from the competition authorities of Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, FYR of Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, the Russian Federation, Serbia and Ukraine.