Biography: Competition

Jason Gudofsky is a partner in Blakes competition, antitrust and foreign investment group. He advises domestic and foreign firms on all aspects of competition law. He regularly provides strategic advice to firms involved in merger and joint venture transactions, including providing risk assessments, navigating reviews through the Canadian Competition Bureau and, where appropriate, co-ordinating and working with economists and foreign counsel. In addition to advising on mergers, Jason provides advice on all other aspects of competition law, including in respect of strategic alliances, unilateral conduct, cartel investigations and compliance matters. He has been involved in the negotiation of complex remedies and orders with the Competition Bureau and before the Competition Tribunal in the context of both mergers and cartel investigations. He has provided competition law advice to clients in a wide range of sectors, including technology, media, advertising, natural resources, oil and gas (upstream and downstream), energy, pharmaceuticals, chemicals, manufacturing, consumer goods, transportation and financial services.

Jason has an active practice advising foreign investors and Canadian vendors under the Investment Canada Act and related guidelines, including the guidelines on investments in Canada by foreign state-owned enterprises. He has represented numerous clients before the investment review division of Industry Canada and the cultural sector investment review branch of Canadian Heritage. He has negotiated undertakings in a wide range of industries to secure net benefit to Canada determinations, this being the standard necessary for reviewable investments to be completed under the Investment Canada Act. Jason also completed the first assessment by the minister of industry under the new national security provisions of the Investment Canada Act.

Jason has advised on hundreds of high-profile transactions in both the EU and Canada, including the following recent examples: Sinopec International Petroleum Exploration and Production Company/Daylight Energy; Johnson & Johnson/Synthes, Inc; Rank Group (UCI)/Honeywell's Consumer Products Group; Rank Group/Dopaco; Continental Airlines, Inc/United Airlines; Sinopec International Petroleum Exploration and Production Company/ConocoPhillips (Syncrude); Yellow Media Inc/Canpages; Jilin Jien Nickel/Goldbrook Ventures; Ericsson/Nortel (CDMA/LTE); SAPA/Indalex Limited; Suncor Energy Inc/Petro-Canada; and Merck & Co, Inc/Schering-Plough Corporation.

Before joining Blakes, Jason practised as a senior associate in the Brussels office of a leading international law firm.

Jason has published numerous articles in leading Canadian and international journals in the areas of competition law, international trade law and foreign investment review. He has spoken at conferences organised by the Canadian Bar Association and the American Bar Association, and has been an active member and contributor of policy work to both associations, including being the former chair of the reviewable matters/unilateral conduct committee and former vice chair of the international competition and trade law committee, national competition law section of the Canadian Bar Association.

Jason has been recognised as a leading competition lawyer in various domestic and international legal publications including: Law Business Research's Who's Who Legal: Canada 2011, Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers for Business 2011, PLC Which Lawyer? 2012, The Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory 2012; Global Competition Review's 'Forty under 40' (2008), and Lexpert Rising Stars' 'Top 40 Lawyers Under 40 in Canada' (2008).