1. Competition and IP Policy
The USC Gould School of Law
Roger Featherston
Commissioner, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission
November 10, 2017

2. Australia

3. ACCC: What we do Consumer protection Competition law
False and misleading conduct
Mergers and acquisitions
Cartels and anti-competitive agreements
Unconscionable conduct and unfair terms
Misuse of market power
Consumer rights to refunds
Product safety and recalls
Regulation
Market inquiries
Telecommunications
Dairy
Bulk water
Gas
Monitoring of fuel prices, airports and ports
Electricity
Mortgage rates
Insurance
New motor vehicles

4. Anti-competitive agreements
Misuse of market power
IP laws confer market power
Competition and Consumer Act 2010 prohibits misuse of market power (e.g. Pfizer case)
From November 6, 2017, a corporation with substantial power in a market, must not engage in conduct with the purpose or likely effect of substantially
lessening competition.
Competition law also prohibits agreements
that substantially lessen competition
(e.g., pharmaceutical pay for delay
agreements)
Anti-competitive agreements

5. Data reforms
Productivity Commission recently made recommendations on “Data Availability and Use” (Report No. 82, March 31, 2017)
Corporations will continue to collect data on consumers 
Don't focus on who “owns” data or limiting use of data
Should focus on obliging a corporation with data to make it available for use by a consumer, including by transmitting it to a third party at consumer's direction
Examples:
Retail electricity data
s and digital photos
Automobile servicing data
Productivity Commission report page 172:
Without a framework in which policy and practice is mutually reinforced in favour of both individual and societal benefit from burgeoning data supply and use, the necessary permission and expectation to dislodge risk aversion in the public sector and desirable confidence in the private sector will remain aspirational.
What we need is a data sharing framework that can scale up, evolve and improve in line with technology. Principles and objectives can be set and institutional arrangements funded judiciously to allow for the modern realities of ubiquitous data collection and use, and to manage risk directly rather than by avoidance or transfer of liability to the less informed (generally an individual, acting either as consumer or respondent to governments). The status quo is not addressing opportunity or risk particularly well.
This Report recommends a Framework that is designed to manage these tensions in a way that enables the benefits of data use to be achieved while managing the risks of harm that could occur.

6. The Productivity Commission inquiry into IP
Intellectual Property Arrangements , Productivity Commission Inquiry Report No. 78, September 23, 2016

7. Roger Featherston Commissioner Australian Competition and Consumer Commission