Competition & Consumer

"ALTA "has a very keen commercial vision and offers prompt services as the team consistently meets deadlines. The lawyers always listen to our needs."

Competition & Consumer

Navigating the Central American legal environment can become a real challenge for many companies. The countries in the region have very different legal schemes, which is challenging for any company that wants to establish itself or that is already doing business in the region.

Competition and antitrust law in the region is handled very differently in each country: we go from Guatemala, which still does not have a competition law, to the case of Costa Rica, which recently approved a strengthening law on the matter. In ALTA, we have an innovative and vigorous practice that advises on the most complex transactions in the market.

Our professional experience includes advising and assisting companies during the process of approving mergers and concentration control before the competition authorities of the different countries in the region, as well as conducting audits and compliance programs that seek to prevent and correct anti-competitive behavior of companies. With us, multiple mergers and acquisitions processes have been successfully completed and exhaustive high-level and complex audits have been completed in the Central American and Caribbean region.

Our experience also includes the defense of companies against investigations of alleged absolute and relative monopolistic practices, such as: horizontal and vertical agreements, cartels and abuses of dominant position. Likewise, we have advised companies that denounce the commission of monopolistic practices carried out by other market agents.

Also, we act on the client's side in risk prevention and mitigation. To achieve this, we have carried out competition compliance audits, as well as the design and implementation of competition and antitrust compliance programs. Finally, we usually issue legal opinions on various topics of competition and consumer law.

In consumer matters, we frequently defend companies investigated by the consumer protection offices of different countries. These complaints usually deal with issues related to laws and consumer protection in cases such as false, misleading and comparative advertising, unfair competition, exercise of guarantees, consumer rights and duties of manufacturers, importers, distributors and sellers. We represent companies both administratively and judicially, litigating consumer issues in the judicial courts of the region.

Our experience in consumer protection also covers advice on sales authorization for real estate developments and cases of term sales such as travel plans and tickets to concerts and public shows.

Finally, our practice has specialized knowledge in certain industries and key areas of trade such as real estate and construction, telecommunications, media, advertising and technology, tobacco and pharmaceuticals, and health sciences. We are the legal advisors in this matter for some of the most representative clients in each industry.