Vivienne Robinson has worked as a competition/antitrust lawyer for over 20 years. She is highly regarded in her field, having worked in the City and Washington D.C. before becoming an independent consultant in 1995. She has represented clients on all aspects of competition law from general compliance to successfully defending alleged cartelists during complex, high-profile investigations taking several years to complete.

An important part of her practice also is to advise merging parties and aggrieved third parties on the application of the merger clearance rules. She regularly represents parties before the Office of Fair Trading, Competition Commission and European Commission. She has considerable experience of cross-border mergers involving clearance in several jurisdictions. Some of her cases have also been highly political, necessitating lobbying and media action. In-depth investigations before the Competition Commission have included ntl/Cable & Wireless, Emap/ABI, Vue Cinemas/Ster Century, Stericycle/Sterile Technolgies, HMV/Waterstone's/Ottakar's and Hamsard/Academy Music.

Career

Vivienne started her career in the City law firm, Stephenson Harwood, with which she qualified as a solicitor in 1987. On further qualification as a New York Attorney in 1990, she moved to the Washington D.C. office of the leading New York firm Winthrop, Stimson, Putnam & Roberts (now part of Pillsbury). There, she worked with Peter Sutherland, the former EU Competition Commissioner, and helped establish the firm's Brussels office.

On returning to the UK, she joined the entertainment law firm, Denton Hall (now Denton Wilde Sapte), where she acted for major media and telecommunications clients. Since the establishment of her own practice nearly 15 years ago, she has represented corporate clients of all sizes from FTSE 100 companies, such as Cable & Wireless plc, to established domestic players in private ownership.

Academic

Vivienne earned her law degree from Cambridge University, where she was a Norfolk County Scholar and University Exhibitioner. She then won a Wiener Anspach scholarship to study at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium, where she was awarded a Grand Distinction in her Masters in European law. While in Brussels, she also worked as a legal translator (French) for De Bandt, Van Hecke, Lagae & Van Bael.

Vivienne has written and lectured extensively, particularly on how to ensure compliance with the competition rules.  She was co-founder of, and for ten years edited, the Essential Merger Control Quarterly, which reported on all the major merger clearance decisions of all the EU's Member States. She has previously served on the Telecommunications Sub-Committee of the American Bar Association's Antitrust Sub-Committee and on the Committee of the Union des Avocats Européens. She is a member of The Law Society's Competition Section.

When she gets the time, she loves painting and photography!

Vivienne Robinson is regulated as a sole practitioner by the Solicitors Regulatory Authority (SRA no. 191268) and is covered for PII purposes by Travelers Insurance Company Limited.  VAT registration number: GB 680936113  Terms and conditions of business are available upon request.