Competition regulation in digital markets: 5 Themes in 5 Minutes (5th Edition)

In an era where growth and innovation are policy imperatives for governments around the world, digital markets remain at the top of the agenda for policymakers and competition agencies.

In 2024, the continued rapid advances in artificial intelligence technologies (especially generative AI) have dominated the zeitgeist. Governments are focused on securing the investment and building the infrastructure required to ensure their countries can reap its promised benefits to be competitive on the global stage.

Against this backdrop, the digital sector has continued to attract significant attention from competition authorities. Over the past year, we have seen extensive use of both traditional competition tools, as well as the new tools that have only recently “come online” (key among them the EU’s Digital Markets Act).

In 2025, enforcers will have more tools at their disposal than ever before, but as always, prioritisation decisions will need to be made. The stakes are high as agencies walk the tightrope between rigorous enforcement and chilling “overregulation”. In this edition of 5 themes in 5 minutes, we look across the globe to pick out five key trends we see as shaping competition enforcement in digital markets in the year ahead: