Biography
Niklas is a partner in Weil’s Antitrust practice and leads the Firm’s Brussels office. He has advised on some of the most high-profile and complex M&A transactions of the past decade, represented corporations on a wide range of behavioural antitrust matters, and acted as lead counsel on antitrust-related litigation and arbitration cases. He routinely represents clients before the European Commission, EU Member States’ competition/foreign investment authorities, and other key regulators globally.
Niklas has been a driving force behind the antitrust group’s ranking in the top ten of GCR’s 2024 Global Elite: Mergers “thanks to rapidly growing competition teams in Brussels”, “excelling in merger control matters”, and boasting “an impressive list of Big Tech clients”. He is widely seen as one of the leading European antitrust lawyers of his generation. Niklas was shortlisted as “Dealmaker of the Year” by Global Competition Review in 2024.
Representative experience includes:*
- Microsoft on its $10 billion investment in OpenAI
- Advent International and NielsenIQ before the European Commission on NielsenIQ’s combination with GfK, winning a rare conditional Phase 1 approval
- Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) on the sale to Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) of a stake in Italo, one of Europe’s leading private high-speed rail operators; as well as GIP on the sale of a stake in Edinburgh Airport to VINCI Airports for £1.27 billion
- TPG on its proposed acquisition of Angelo, Gordon & Co., L.P., a $73 billion alternative investment firm focused on credit and real estate investing
- A third-party in relation to the European Commission’s investigations into Amazon/iRobot and Amazon/MGM
- Alibaba.com on its investment in Visable Group
- Advent International on its $6.4 billion acquisition of Maxar Technologies, a provider of space solutions and geospatial intelligence
- Brookfield Renewable Partners on its $7.9 billion acquisition of nuclear power plant equipment maker Westinghouse Electric before the European Commission
- Eutelsat on its $3.4 billion combination with OneWeb before the European Commission and multiple antitrust agencies globally, creating a leading satellite services provider
- Microsoft on its ~$70 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Inc., before the European Commission, winning conditional Phase 2 approval in what is widely recognised as one of the most significant antitrust matters to-date. The transaction was selected for “Matter of the Year,” a global category that encompasses all forms of antitrust, as well as “Merger Control Matter of the Year: Americas” and “Merger Control Matter of the Year: Europe,” which honor deals that featured “creative, strategic and innovative competition work for a client on a landmark merger control matter” across respective jurisdictions.
- Brookfield on its €17.5 billion acquisition of Deutsche Telekom AG’s tower business and its $16 billion acquisition of Nielsen
- An affiliate of Lone Star Funds on the €5.2 billion sale of MBCC Group to Sika before the European Commission and multiple antitrust agencies globally, obtaining conditional EC Phase 1 approval
- NVIDIA on its then-proposed $40 billion acquisition of Arm
- Alstom on its acquisition of Bombardier Transportation before the European Commission winning conditional Phase 1 approval, and on its then-proposed €15 billion combination with Siemens. The Financial Times described it as “one of the most important test cases for the European Commission,” and “setting a political precedent that could reshape the EU’s approach to contentious mergers in strategic industries for years to come”
- LVMH Group on its $16.2 billion acquisition of Tiffany & Co., the largest deal in the luxury industry to date, obtaining unconditional EC Phase 1 approval
- Google in the European Commission investigation into data-related practices
- Deutsche Bank’s DWS on several merger control matters before the European Commission and other antitrust agencies globally
- Capgemini on its acquisition of Altran Technologies before the European Commission, creating a €17 billion IT and digital services group
- Allergan in connection with Allergan’s then-proposed $160 billion merger with Pfizer and with the industry-transforming $39 billion sale of its generic pharmaceuticals business to Teva following conditional EC Phase 1 approval
- LG Chem in relation to BASF’s €1.6 billion acquisition of Solvay’s nylon business
- Samsung Electronics in its $1.05 billion sale of its worldwide printer business to HP Inc before the European Commission
- Lafarge in connection with its €40 billion merger with Holcim, creating the world’s largest cement supplier, winning conditional EC Phase 1 approval
- Gazprom in its $2 billion asset swap with Wintershall and in a multibillion gas arbitration with a European wholesaler
- Recticel, Europe’s leading PU foam supplier, in one of the first EC cartel settlement cases
- A multinational semiconductor supplier in a European Commission abuse of dominance investigation
- Danske Statsbaner (DSB), the national Danish railway company, in successful trademark litigation before the European Court of Justice
- A leading oil & gas major in EU antitrust proceedings, including dawn raids
- A top-tier chemicals supplier in an EU investigation into alleged abuse of dominance conduct
- A major natural gas storage company on an antitrust law defense in arbitration proceedings before the German Arbitration Institute (DIS)
- A leading oil & gas company in SCC arbitration proceedings involving Articles 101 and 102 TFEU
- A global pharmaceutical company in arbitration proceedings resulting from the implementation of EU commitments following a conditional merger control approval
(*including from previous firm)