Professional notice
PLMJ has two competition partners in its Lisbon headquarters, José Luís da Cruz Vilaça and Ricardo Oliveira. Both are Who’s Who nominees. Vilaça, together with Oliveira, launched PLMJ’s competition practice in 1996, after six years as president of Europe’s Court of First Instance. The firm’s competition team also includes 11 associates.
AM Pereira Sáragga Leal Oliveira Martins JÚdice & Associados
| Global head: José Luís da Cruz Vilaça |
| Home jurisdiction: Portugal |
| Total size of firm: 220 |
| No. of competition lawyers: 13 |
| % of firm specialised: 6 |
| Who’s Who nominees: 2 |
| Equity partners: 1 |
| Non-equity partners: 1 |
| Senior associates: 2 |
| Associates: 9 |
| No. of lateral partner hires: 0 |
| No. of partner departures: 0 |
| No. of internal promotions: 0 |
Thanks to its large corporate department, PLMJ handles plenty of deal-related competition work. According to Oliveira, his team works on at least 20 mergers each year, including many of Portugal’s largest matters. For example, it advised French supermarket chain Carrefour in the €660 million sale of its Portuguese hypermarket stores Modelo/Continente to the country’s largest conglomerate, Sonae.
PLMJ was also joint counsel to Farmindústria, José de Mello and Alliance Santé in the notification to the Portugal’s Competition Authority of the acquisition of joint control over Alliance Unichem, Portugal’s largest pharmaceuticals distributor. This was the largest pharmaceuticals case the authority had ever handled. It was approved without commitments after a second-phase investigation. PLMJ also advised Gas Natural on its €22 billion bid for Endesa.
Contentious matters form a large part of PLMJ’s practice, too. The firm successfully appealed to the Lisbon Commercial Court on behalf of pharmaceutical company Bayer against a cartel fine issued by the authority. The decision was overturned for breach of the defendant’s rights and referred back to the authority for re-examination. PLMJ also advised Nestlé on a €1 million fine for an alleged vertical infringement – again, the decision was overturned by the Lisbon Commercial Court for breaching the defendant’s rights and the case was referred back to the authority.
PLMJ is also advising the Azores autonomous region in an appeal to the European Court of Justice over a European Commission decision on state aid received from Portugal.
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.plmj.com
Contacts:
José Luís da Cruz Vilaça
[email protected]
Ricardo Oliveira
[email protected]
tel: +351 21 319 73 21
fax: +351 21 319 73 19
EU and Competition
The EU and Competition Department is
particularly focused on EU law and
Competition.
This Department is coordinated by Senior
Partner José Luís da Cruz Vilaça.
We led some of the most prominent
antitrust and merger cases concerning the
Portuguese market and handled a large
number of important public procurement,
State aid, regulatory (telecoms, energy,
transport, water supply, data protection,
environment and waste disposal) cases,
either before the national authorities, the
European Commission or the Portuguese
and EU courts.
Lisboa (Head Office)
Edifício Eurolex
Av. da Liberdade, 224
1250-148 Lisboa
Tel. +351 21 319 73 00
Fax. +351 21 319 74 00
Local Offices:
Porto
Algarve
International Offices: Brazil, Angola and Macao (in joint venture with local Firms)
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