Violette Grac-Aubert

Violette is a Managing Associate in the Antitrust & Foreign Investment practice of Linklaters in Paris. She advises clients in all areas of competition law and, in particular, in antitrust litigation, audits and merger control.

Violette joined Linklaters as a trainee in the Brussels Antitrust & Foreign Investment team in 2014 and further joined the Paris Antitrust & Foreign Investment team as an associate in 2015.

Recent significant matters in which Violette has been involved include:

• Advising Intermarché group in 2021 on its alliance with Casino Group in the area of purchasing, digital marketing and agri-food products, which will be the first notification to the French Competition Authority under its new procedure for central buying services;
• Advising Peugeot on its merger with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles which would create the fourth largest global OEM in terms of annual unit sales (8.7m vehicles) with combined revenues of almost €170 billion;
• Advising Peugeot on its acquisition of Opel, creating the second largest player in Europe, which was notified and cleared by the European Commission as well as in more than a dozen jurisdictions around the world; this transaction included the acquisition, together with BNP, of Opel’s banking business, which triggered separate merger filings in a number of jurisdictions including the European Commission;
• Advising Sanofi in a high profile swap operation of its Animal Health business, lodged with its subsidiary Merial, for Boehringer’s Consumer Health Care. This matter was nominated to receive the “Matter of the Year” award at the GCR Awards 2017;
• Advising Marilyn Agency in the framework of an investigation of the French Competition Authority (FCA) in the market for model agencies regarding price fixing practice, involving nearly all market players as well as the professional federation, and in related appeal proceedings against the FCA decision. On appeal, she helped to secure a reduction by half of Marilyn’s fine imposed by the FCA;
• Representing Peugeot and its subsidiary Gefco in the framework of an FCA investigation against courier companies and professional federation suspected of collusion on tariff increases and on the creation of a fuel surcharge, and in related appeal proceedings against the FCA decision;
• Advising Optionizr, an innovative application offering a system of online booking options, as part of an application for protective measures before the FCA against a dominant operator;
• Advising a pharmaceutical company regarding a joint venture on antitrust issues relating to the codevelopment and co-commercialisation of a new vaccine;
• Advising L'Oréal in a proposed merger notification at a worldwide scale. 

Violette’s publications include:

Wolters Kluwer Actualités du droit – « Application du RGPD : la concurrence mène la danse ? » (March 2018)

Recueil Dalloz – « La clémence privée : une innovation au service de la réparation du dommage anti-concurrentiel » (January 2015)

European Competition Law Review –  « A love and hate relationship? Recent developments in data protection and competition law » (July 2015)

Recueil Dalloz – « Net recul de la Commission sur les actions collectives » (March 2011)