Alan McCarthy is a Partner in EU and Competition Law Group. Alan has represented clients in a range of sectors including telecommunications, aviation, banking, insurance, healthcare, food, beverages and petroleum before the Irish Competition Authority and the European Commission.
He specialises in advice on the competition law implications of mergers and joint ventures. He has advised on many of the recent mergers notified to the Irish Competition Authority (including mergers that have been investigated in Phase 2 of the Irish Competition Authority's merger procedures) and on mergers notified to the European Commission.
Alan also specialises in advice on competition law enforcement issues (such as leniency applications, dawn raids, compliance programmes and competition law litigation) as well as complaints to the Irish Competition Authority and the European Commission. He has significant sectoral regulatory experience, particularly in the telecommunications and energy sectors in Ireland. In addition, he advises on a wide range of other EU law matters such as State aid.
Alan is recommended in a number of leading legal directories where he is described as: “a brilliant, pragmatic lawyer who focuses on the important issues" (Chambers Europe 2010); “an incredibly hard worker who is technically skilful on complex issues” (Chambers Europe 2009) and "extremely knowledgeable on competition law issues, very hardworking and thorough" as well as "even-tempered and courteous" (Chambers Europe 2008). He is also recommended in Global Competition Review 2009 as being among the world's pre-eminent Competition lawyers and is ranked in Best Lawyers 2010, The International Who's Who of Competition Lawyers 2010, PLC Which Lawyer? 2008 and 2009 and The Legal 500 2008.
He regularly lectures on competition law matters both in Ireland and abroad and is co-author of the leading Irish competition law text book "Irish Competition Law: Competition Act, 2002".