Mark is a market-leading competition lawyer and head of Corrs’ competition group.
Mark specialises in Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) merger clearance, cartel immunity processes, defending ACCC investigations and prosecutions, private competition litigation and managing major inquiries by economic regulators. He has a proven track record of securing merger clearances for difficult transactions and successfully defending novel regulatory claims.
Mark’s clients are leading players across a range of industries, but he has particular expertise in relation to digital platforms and tech, oil and gas, retail, network infrastructure and healthcare.
Mark is recognised as a leading Australian competition law advisor by all major guides, including Chambers and Partners (Band 1), Legal 500, Best Lawyers and Global Competition Review. He was named Competition Partner of the Year by Client Choice in 2019, Lawyers Weekly in 2020, Best Lawyers in 2021 and Lawyers Weekly again in 2022. He has extensive experience in multi-jurisdictional matters and worked earlier in his career in a leading antitrust practice in Washington DC.
Key deals
Defending Google in relation to Federal Court proceedings commenced by Epic Games alleging anticompetitive conduct in connection with the Google Play Store and Android mobile operating system. This complex matter was heard in a 16-week trial with concurrent proceedings commenced against Apple and also involves two follow-on class actions.
Meta
Acting for Meta Platforms in the ACCC clearance of its acquisition of Kustomer, a customer relationship management (CRM) company.
Defending Google in proceedings commenced by the ACCC alleging that Google engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct in relation to the collection, retention and use of consumers’ location data on Android phones and tablets. The litigation was the first matter to be tried worldwide concerning Google’s use of location data.
Stockland
Acting for a capital partnership between Stockland and Supalai on its A$1.06 billion acquisition of 12 residential masterplanned communities from Lendlease. ACCC clearance was obtained on the basis of a project divestiture.
L3 Technologies
Acting for L3 Technologies in obtaining ACCC clearance for its US$34 billion merger-of-equals with Harris Corporation – at the time, the largest defence merger in history.
Staples
Acting for Staples on the successful application for ACCC clearance of its global proposed acquisition of Office Depot (trading in Australia as OfficeMax).
Defending Google in Federal Court proceedings commenced by the ACCC alleging that Google misled Australian consumers to obtain their consent to expand the scope of personal information that Google could collect and combine about consumers’ internet activity, for use by Google, including for targeted advertising. The Court found comprehensively in Google’s favour.
Refinitiv
Acting for Refinitiv in relation to the Australian regulatory clearances of its US$27 billion acquisition by the London Stock Exchange Group.
BP
Defending BP in an ACCC prosecution of five petrol retailers and a data intermediary, in relation to the alleged anticompetitive effects of an industry price information sharing scheme. This litigation was an important test case regarding the application of Australian competition laws to price information sharing arrangements and was settled without penalties or admissions.
BP
Acted for BP in obtaining unconditional ACCC clearance for its acquisition of Reliance Petroleum, in the disposal of its South Australian retail network and its proposed acquisition of Woolworths’ entire 530 site network, which was described by the ACCC Chairman as the most significant merger review of the year.