Insights

Brussels – May 22, 2024: Senior antitrust regulators from the European Commission, the U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority, and the U.S. Department of Justice will join industry and academic leaders for in-depth discussions at the Crowell & Moring and King's College London Sixth Annual EU Competition Law Conference on June 11 at TheMerode in Brussels.

In recent years, there has been a wave of new legislation impacting contracts and contractual terms. The Belgian legislator is gradually adopting the different Books of our new Belgian Civil Code, such as Book VI. Last February, a new proposal for Book VII on special contracts, including sale and loan agreements was submitted. Additionally, the Belgian Code of Economic Law has been updated several times, impacting the drafting of contracts and of contractual terms, not only between companies but also with consumers.

Under its new leadership, the Belgian Competition Authority (BCA) has stepped up its enforcement activities and launched a number of initiatives and investigations that put it at the forefront of competition law developments in the European Union.

On 8 May 2025, the European Commission published new lists of products potentially subject to EU rebalancing measures in retaliation to U.S. tariffs. The proposed measures would apply if EU-U.S. trade negotiations fail. They are designed to stand alongside previously adopted EU countermeasures, which are currently suspended until 14 July 2025.

On June 13, 2024, the European Union (EU) adopted the Artificial Intelligence Act (EU AI Act), making it the first-ever global law to regulate the use of artificial intelligence in a broad and horizontal manner. The historic measure applies to the development, deployment, and use of AI in the EU. Importantly, the EU AI Act has a certain “extra-territorial” effect to the extent that it is applicable to providers placing AI systems on the market in the EU, even if these providers are established outside the EU.

Class actions and their (possible) role in European law jurisdictions have been a hot topic for quite a while and this is not likely to change. The new EU directive 2020/1828 imposes the obligation upon EU member states to introduce a specific legal procedure for collective repair by 25 June 2023. In Belgium, such a procedure for collective repair was already introduced in 2014. With the imminent implementation of said EU directive into Belgian law, this procedure is likely to undergo some substantial changes. During this in-person seminar, Werner Eyskens, Evelien Van Espen, Yaël Rager and Charlotte Stynen will discuss the current and future role of class actions in Belgium, the contours of the existing procedure for collective repair and the potential impact of the expected new rules, as well as the role of third-party litigation funding and the fate of collective proceedings that fall outside the scope of the existing procedure and the new directive.

Wij hebben het genoegen u uit te nodigen voor de officiële voorstelling van het boek “Concentratiecontrole in België” van Karel Bourgeois op 8 december 2022.

Crowell & Moring Partner Sari Depreeuw, a partner in Crowell & Moring’s Brussels office and a member of the firm’s Technology & Brand Protection Group, will be speaking at this year's Academy of European Law's Summer Course on European Information Technology Law, taking place in Trier, Germany on September 19-23. Her presentation, "The EU Legal Framework for Data, Big Data and Databases," will take place on September 22nd at 1:30 p.m. (local time).

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