Policy Brief on electricity markets
Policy Brief | Issue 10 | October 11, 2022
In its tenth policy brief, "Further Development of Electricity Markets, Designing a Price Cap in Conformity with Competition", the Monopolies Commission makes recommendations on the electricity price cap. The Monopolies Commission recommends that a response to price increases on the electricity market should be designed in a targeted manner and in line with the market:
- The electricity market design should be retained but further developed in the medium term.
- The cap for additional revenues (windfall profits) should - as far as possible - be carried out uniformly for conventional power generators, taking forward contracts into account.
- The top priority in providing relief to consumers must be to avoid weakening incentives to save energy. At the same time, the neediness of the households to be relieved should be taken into account.
Entrepreneur of the very first hour in Germany's digital economy Constanze Buchheim becomes a member of the Monopolies Commission
Berlin/Bonn, September 30, 2022
The German government has appointed entrepreneur Constanze Buchheim as a member of the Monopolies Commission for the term of office from October 1, 2022 to June 30, 2026.
Constanze Buchheim has been active in the digital economy for 15 years. She started her career in 2006 at e-commerce pioneer Spreadshirt and founded i-potentials in 2009 as the leading executive search boutique of the digital and innovation landscape, emerging from the startup scene. As part of this role and her work as a business angel and advisory board member, she has accompanied the growth of countless well-known startups and digital players as well as the transformation of medium-sized companies, family businesses and corporations in Germany. She is a recognized expert on the topic of future leadership and has shaped the leadership and organizational structures of companies that are now among the beacons of the German innovation landscape. Buchheim is also a member of the supervisory board of the "HHL Leipzig Graduate School of Management" and of the software company "Valsight" and has been president of the international Entrepreneurs Organization (Berlin Chapter) since July 2022. Handelsblatt ranked her among the 50 most influential women in the tech industry in 2021 and selected her as one of the 50 best female entrepreneurs in Germany in 2022.
Buchheim succeeds entrepreneur Dr. Thomas Nöcker, who retired from the Monopolies Commission on June 30, 2022, after serving three terms.
Prof. Dr. Tomaso Duso new member of the Monopolies Commission, terms of Dr. Thomas Nöcker and Prof. Achim Wambach Ph.D. end
Berlin/Bonn, June 30, 2022
The German government has appointed Prof. Dr. Tomaso Duso as a member of the Monopolies Commission for a term from 1 July 2022 to 30 June 2026.
New Commission member Tomaso Duso has been Head of the Firms and Markets Department at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin) since 2013 and a professor of empirical industrial economics at the Technische Universität (TU) Berlin since 2018. From 2011 to 2018, he was a university professor at the Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE) at the Heinrich-Heine-Universität (HHU) Düsseldorf. He is spokesperson of the Berlin Centre for Consumer Policies (BCCP) and a Research Fellow for the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and the Centre for Economic Studies (CESIfo) as well as a member of the Economic Advisory Group on Competition Policy (EAGCP) of the European Commission. His research focuses on applied econometrics in the fields of industrial organization, competition policy, regulation and management.
Prof. Dr. Tomaso Duso succeeds Prof. Achim Wambach Ph.D. who will retire from the Commission after two terms on 30 June 2022. Prof. Wambach was a member of the Monopolies Commission from July 2014 to June 2022 and its Chairman from March 2016 to September 2020. Also on 30 June 2022, Dr. Thomas Nöcker will retire from the Commission after three terms. Dr. Nöcker was a member of the Monopolies Commission from July 2010 to June 2022. The German government has not yet decided on his successor.
Important topics of the Monopolies Commission during the memberships of Thomas Nöcker and Achim Wambach were the abuse control of platform companies, the further development of the analysis of company concentration with a view to institutional investors and cross-sectoral indicators of market power as well as distortions of competition in international trade due to subsidies to state and private companies in China. In addition, the Monopolies Commission's opinions on the health care markets are to be mentioned, in particular the Special Report on the development of competition in the German health insurance system and the current Special Report on the reorganisation of hospital care. The Monopolies Commission would like to express its special thanks to Dr. Nöcker and Prof. Wambach for their commitment to competition.
