William Kolasky is a partner in the firm's Regulatory and Government Affairs Department, and a member of the Antitrust and Competition Practice Group. He joined the firm in 1975.
Mr. Kolasky has been practicing antitrust law in Washington DC for over 30 years and served as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General for International Enforcement in the Antitrust Division of the US Department of Justice from 2001 to 2002. He is credited with being one of the architects of the new International Competition Network, a network of nearly 100 competition authorities worldwide designed to promote international cooperation and convergence and to streamline the multinational merger review process.
Practice
Mr. Kolasky's practice includes the full range of antitrust litigation and counseling. He regularly represents clients in antitrust litigation before courts all over the country. He also represents clients in criminal and civil investigations before both the Antitrust Division of the US Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission. He has secured antitrust clearance from the two agencies for more than 100 mergers and acquisitions, and has coordinated merger reviews in multiple other jurisdictions around the world. He also regularly counsels clients about antitrust aspects of a wide variety of business arrangements from joint ventures to distribution agreements.
Recent Highlights
- Secured dismissal of all antitrust claims in the massive Insurance Brokerage Antitrust MDL
- Secured dismissal of an antitrust class action challenging the DVD patent pools, which he successfully defended on appeal in the Federal Circuit
- Won a precedent-setting appeal in the Second Circuit (JLM v. Stolt-Nielsen) holding that damage claims arising from an alleged global customer allocation conspiracy were subject to arbitration
- Obtained a substantial downward departure for “exemplary cooperation” on behalf of a major Norwegian shipping company in a widely-publicized US antitrust grand jury investigation into alleged customer allocation in the global chemical parcel tanker industry
Professional Activities
Mr. Kolasky has published more than 50 articles on antitrust law and speaks regularly on antitrust subjects in both the United States and Europe. He has taught antitrust law at the American University's Washington College of Law. Mr. Kolasky has been active in the Section on Antitrust Law of the American Bar Association for many years and currently serves as an Associate Editor for their Antitrust Magazine. Previously, he served on the Section Council from 1998 to 2001.
Honors and Awards
- Listed in the 2010 and 2012 editions of Benchmark Litigation for his leading antitrust practice
- Recognized as a leader in his field in the 2009, 2010 and 2011 editions of Who's Who of Competition Lawyers and Economists
- Recognized as a leader in the competition/antitrust field in Chambers Global 2009, 2010 and 2011
- Nominated by in-house counsel and peers for inclusion in the Guide to the World's Leading Competition & Antitrust Lawyers, 8th Edition
- Ranked as the fourth most highly regarded competition lawyer in the world in the 2007 edition of Who's Who Legal, The International Who's Who of Business Lawyers; selected as an international leader in competition in each edition since 2005
- "Highly Recommended" in the PLC Cross-border Competition Handbook 2006/07 and recognized as a "Leading Lawyer" in the 2009/2010 edition for competition/antitrust
- Consistently recognized as a national leader in antitrust in Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers for Business (2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 editions)
- Recognized by his peers as one of the world's leading antitrust attorneys in Legal Media Group's The Best of the Best 2006 and The Best of the Best 2011
- Selected by his peers as one of The Best Lawyers in America in the area of antitrust law each year since 2005
- Selected by Washingtonian magazine as one of the "Top Lawyers" in Washington DC, 2004, 2007, 2009 and 2011
- Selected by his peers as a "Super Lawyer" in the 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 editions of Washington D.C. SuperLawyers
