Online lunchtime workshop - Empirical study on the impact of mergers reviewed by the Commission on innovation and markups

On 4 September 2026, DG Competition published a new empirical study on the impact of mergers reviewed by the Commission on innovation and markups  prepared by Professors Joel Stiebale (DICE, Heinrich Heine University Dusseldorf) and Florian Szücs (WU Vienna University of Economics).  

The study conducts an empirical ex-post assessment of the impact of mergers on innovation and markups on both the merging firms and rivals. It studies a sample of more than 3000 mergers reviewed and cleared - with or without conditions - by the EU Commission between 1990 and 2024. The research is based on data from a novel EU Merger Database and other data-sources. 

The empirical assessment indicates that, on average, these mergers have reduced innovation – as measured by citation weighted patent output – of merging firms as well as of rivals. At the same time, average markups and accounting profits have tended to increase post-merger.  These simultaneous decreases of patenting and increases of both markups and profits for both merging firms and rivals are more consistent with increased market power than merger-induced efficiencies. 

This study is particularly relevant at the time of the ongoing review of the EU Merger Guidelines, in the context of which the Commission study on the dynamic effects of mergers was also recently published.   

On Tuesday 15 September 2026, DG Competition organises an online lunchtime workshop to discuss the findings of the new empirical study with economic experts and to compare the findings of the study to other recent research. At the workshop the presentation of the study report by the authors will be followed by a discussion with Fiona Scott Morton (Yale University), Sara Calligaris (OECD) and Giulio Federico (Oxera). 

Watch the video recording of the workshop