June 18, 2026, 07:00 GMT | Insight
Australia's competition watchdog has seen a sharp increase in merger notifications since Australia’s mandatory regime began in January, with filings in six months matching a typical full year under the old system. The regulator says the framework improves early visibility of deals, enables more targeted competition enforcement, boosts transparency, and has made Australia one of the first jurisdictions consulted in global transactions, though concerns remain about strict thresholds and automatic penalties. Separately, the regulator is advancing plans for ex ante regulation of digital platforms — focusing on app marketplaces, in-app payments and adtech.
The
Australian Competition & Consumer Commission, or ACCC, is reporting a sharp uptick in merger notification filings since the regime became mandatory in January.
ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said the regulator had seen more transactions in six months than it previously saw in a year under the previous informal regime. She said the agency averaged around 300 transactions a year over the past decade, and has recorded the same number — combining notifications and waiver requests — in the past six months, with the regulator receiving 50 merger notifications and 108 waiver applications between Jan. 1 and March 31.
“That is allowing us to progressively build a better understanding of patterns of consolidation in different sectors,” said Cass-Gottlieb.
She said the benefits for the agency are that it sees deals earlier and focuses on the small number that truly risk harming competition, enabling more effective review to protect and promote competition.
Additionally, the Australian watchdog is now among the first set of regulators approached for global transactions, “the exact reverse” of what was happening before the mandatory regime was implemented, Cass-Gottlieb said.
“The change has made the difference that we were looking for,” she added.
In a report published by the ACCC in April (see
here), the regulator said that between July 1 and Dec. 31, 2025, when the new regime was available on a voluntary basis, it received only 13 notifications.
The regulator set itself a target to process 80 percent of notifications within 20 business days. After three months, the agency said the mandatory regime was off to a smooth start (see
here). At two events* this week, Cass-Gottlieb said the ACCC is continuing to exceed its benchmarks by processing 90 percent of notifications within that time period.
A spokesperson for the ACCC said: "Those matters that take longer are generally those that raise potential competition issues and therefore require more detailed consideration and investigation, including seeking further information and engagement with the merger parties and third parties, such as customers."
“It's an exciting time,” Cass-Gottlieb said at a conference in Brussels. “I'm very pleased with how our systems and our people and our teams have performed in the first six months — and we are still learning a lot.”
Previously, 90 percent of transactions were confidential in Australia and completed without public scrutiny. The new regime operated on a voluntary basis for six months before becoming mandatory and suspensory in January, aligning with similar merger systems worldwide, Cass-Gottlieb said.
She said Australia’s new merger regime was implemented after the regulator engaged with counterparts, including the
European Commission. Now, Australia’s framework exceeds those in other jurisdictions in terms of transparency, requiring the watchdog to publish decisions within 24 hours, she said.
“It is actually the most detailed requirement of transparency anywhere in the world,” she added.
Still, the regime has attracted some criticism and calls for change.
The review framework was implemented with a provision that automatically voids transactions if they are not notified to the ACCC. Andrew Leigh, Assistant Minister for Productivity, Competition, Charities and Treasury, on Tuesday said the government is planning to introduce legislation soon to make that discretionary after consulting with business stakeholders (see
here).
The ACCC in a statement said it supported those changes, but wants “to ensure that the incentives to notify are preserved.”
Another point of concern: thresholds. The regime includes strict requirements for notification of deals, including all transactions where the merging parties have combined Australian revenue exceeding A$200 million ($140 million), and additional thresholds for serial acquisitions and for certain sectors like supermarkets (see
here).
Peta Stevenson, a partner at law firm Mallesons, in May said the regime has had “unintended consequences” by prioritizing certainty over flexibility (see
here). She suggested the government could adjust those thresholds to prevent over-capture with a review required after the mandatory regime has been in effect for 12 months.
— ex ante rules —
While reiterating that the work on forward-looking digital platforms regulation, or ex ante rules, is “continuing and underway,” Cass-Gottlieb said the ACCC remains of the view that obligations on major digital platforms are best implemented through targeted, service-specific codes that clearly define compliance requirements upfront.
She also said that the ACCC was conscious it is important that Australia's framework is aligned and complementary to regulatory measures adopted in other leading jurisdictions.
She said that greater coherence would improve efficiency and clarity for businesses while allowing regulators to draw on international experience in assessing how effectively the obligations are implemented and whether they achieve their intended outcomes.
Cass-Gottlieb told the Brussels conference that the Australian government has identified app marketplaces — like
Apple's App Store and
Google's Play Store — and their in-app payment services along with adtech services as the first specified services to be investigated.
“We think that makes sense, that is, for designation. Both our inquiry and information from our international counterparts… have recognized both services as highlighting priority concerns, especially in relation to issues such as anti-competitive self-preferencing, anti-competitive economy, lack of transparency and lack of interoperability,” she said.
She recently told MLex (see
here) that the ACCC will continue to rely on its existing enforcement toolkit to address competition and other similar concerns in digital-platform markets until a dedicated ex ante regime is introduced.
These tools could include competition litigation, enforceable undertakings, market monitoring and even consumer-protection cases, she said.
-Additional reporting from Lewis Crofts
*Australia's "Fair Go" Agenda: Ashurst's discussion with the Hon Andrew Leigh MP and ACCC Chair, Gina Cass-Gottlieb, Ashurst Sydney, June 16, 2026.
European Competition Forum Midsummer Meeting with ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb and Willard Mwemba, Chief Executive Officer, COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission, Brussels, June 16-18, 2026.
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