Rethinking Competition Enforcement for Sustainable Data-driven Ecosystems

This paper explores data-driven ecosystems as a governance model to foster informed and sustainable choices by businesses, consumers and stakeholders. Data-driven ecosystems have a pivotal role in ensuring the EU’s twin transition objectives of digitalization and sustainability. However, these ecosystems face challenges in achieving the transition targets. These challenges are related to the environmental impacts of their consumption and the businesses' reluctance to share data. To address these challenges and consider the interplay between digitalization and sustainability, the EU approach calls for the alignment of all policies, including competition. Consequently, EU competition policy and enforcement are undergoing a comprehensive revision process to complement regulatory initiatives. Recent revisions in competition law, such as the 2024 Revised Notice on the Definition of the Relevant Market, highlight the integration of sustainability and digital considerations into competition enforcement. However, to fully leverage the potential of sustainable data-driven ecosystems, it is necessary to rethink competition enforcement. Analytical tools and shortcuts must evolve to consider the interplay between digitalization and sustainability. Although analytical tools are going to consider the digital and sustainability effects of data-driven ecosystems, analytical shortcuts have yet to evolve accordingly. The author stresses that the evolution of economic premises, proxies and presumptions is crucial to leverage the potential of sustainable data-driven ecosystems within competitive markets.