Team

Bas Dessens is a Director at the London office. He joined E.CA Economics in 2006 and has extensive experience in the field of competition economics. In particular, his work has focused on damage assessments related to cartel/information exchange cases (e.g., trucks, smart-card chips, air cargo) and economic analysis in the context of merger proceedings (e.g., EssilorLuxottica/GrandVision, Holcim/Lafarge, Knauf/Armstrong). Bas was further engaged in cases related to state aid, abuse of dominance, and regulatory matters.

Bas has experience in a broad range of sectors, including transportation, lifts, advertising, microelectronics, pharmaceuticals, beverage distribution, beer, retail, telecommunications, auditing services, film distribution, car parks, forklift trucks, gas-insulated switchgear, and other commodity industries.

Bas supported clients on cases brought before the European Commission, the German Bundeskartellamt, the UK Competition and Markets Authority, the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets, and the Belgian Competition Authority. For more than a year, Bas was seconded to the UK Competition Commission (the Competition and Markets Authority’s predecessor), where he worked on several merger proceedings and a market investigation.

Prior to joining E.CA, Bas served as a consultant for a business consultancy in the Netherlands. While there, he worked on a number of projects that focused on the consumer electronics, chemicals, and oil and gas industries. Bas holds master’s degrees from Tilburg University in the Netherlands and the Humboldt University of Berlin in the areas of business and economics.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Dr Hans W. Friederiszick is a Director and founder of E.CA Economics. Dr Friederiszick has more than 20 years of experience advising clients across the competition economics field, i.e. mergers, cartels, abuse of a dominant position and State aid cases, and has led teams of economists engaged in international antitrust investigations. He has been retained as an economic expert in the German, UK and other European courts and has been named in Global Competition Review’s (GCR) Who’s Who as one of the field’s leading competition economists. According to WWL’s 2022 client survey Dr Friederiszick “is an exceptional competition economist” and, according to the same survey, “his in-depth knowledge and experience in the field is impressive”.

In 2024, he was again listed as a Global Elite Thought Leader in WWL Competition report. Additionally, the renowned German legal publication JUVE ranked him among the very top competition economists in Germany in 2023.

Dr Friederiszick was part of the first Chief Economist Team of DG COMP (2003 to 2006) and is a Research Fellow at ESMT Berlin. He has published widely and is a regular speaker at international antitrust conferences. Recent publications address the economic analysis in European competition law (NOMOS Kommentar, Europäisches Wettbewerbsrecht, 2023 and 2024), reverse privatization in waste collection (Review of Industrial Organization, 2022) and cartel litigation activity (Journal of Antitrust Enforcement, 2021).

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Dr. Ela Głowicka has over 15 years of experience in competition economics from her roles in economic consulting, enforcement, and academia. She advised clients in private litigation cases for damages from cartels, vertical agreements, and abuse of dominance in court proceedings across Austria, Brazil, Finland, Germany, and Slovenia. Additionally, Ela supported a complainant in an abuse of dominance complaint to the European Commission. She also advised merging parties in merger proceedings in front of the European Commission, the German Federal Cartel Office, the Polish Office for Competition and Consumer Protection, the United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority, and the Slovenian Competition Protection Agency. Furthermore, she testified as a court expert in a private litigation matter related to excessive pricing.

In the area of State aid, Ela has extensive expertise in the ex-post evaluation of the European State aid rules. She co-authored retrospective evaluation studies for State aid for banks in difficulty, the regional State aid framework, the State aid guidelines for railways, and the State aid rules for environmental protection and energy, all published by DG Competition. In this context, Ela set up and managed international teams of consultants and researchers. Moreover, in her doctoral thesis, she evaluated the effects of rescue and restructuring aid on the survival probability of firms in difficulty. While working at the Chief Economist Team of DG Competition, Ela provided case advice to the Commissioner on State aid matters and contributed to the staff working paper on the methodology of State aid evaluation.

Ela joined E.CA Economics as a manager in 2013 and since then was promoted to director. Before that, she gained first-hand insight into EU competition policy developments as a member of the Chief Economist Team in DG Competition. She holds a doctoral degree from Humboldt University for the thesis on competition policy applied to bailouts.

For the policy briefing on State aid to rail freight transport Ela received an Antitrust Writing Award 2024 in the category of business articles on cross-border issues.

Ela works in English, German and Polish.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Dr Linda Gratz is a Director at E.CA Economics in the Munich office. With over 15 years of experience, she has been a leading force in providing economic advice across the competition-law field, representing clients before the EU Commission and various national competition authorities.

Linda has conducted damage assessments in numerous high-profile cartel cases in the context of private litigation. These include fast-moving consumer goods such as drugstore products, roasted coffee, confectionery and flour. Beyond this, she has navigated complex cases in financial markets, dealing with multilateral interchange fees and reference interest rates (LIBOR). Her portfolio also includes cases as diverse as lotteries, gas-insulated switchgears, fire trucks, and automotive electronics.

Her analytical expertise is equally evident in the merger assessments, where she has worked on cases across various sectors such as telecommunications, petrol stations, construction materials, copper, fast-moving consumer goods, press logistics and touristic flights. Her work encompasses Phase I and II investigations before the EU Commission and various national competition authorities.

Since her doctoral thesis, Linda has developed a particular passion for abuse of dominance cases. She has advised clients in investigations involving predatory pricing, bundled rebates, excessive charges and refusal to supply. Her in-depth knowledge spans rail, insurances, and IP-related industries.

Currently, Linda is at the forefront of a high-profile case, advising a telecom operator in proceedings against a Big Tech company. Both parties accuse each other of abusing a dominant position, and Linda’s team assesses the relative bargaining power in bilateral negotiations over fees for IP data transport. This case is pivotal in the ongoing “fair share” debate at EU level, which aims to bolster network operators’ incentives to invest in Next Generation Networks.

Beyond her casework, Linda’s contributions to the OECD Roundtable on the role of efficiency claims in abuse of dominance cases underscore her thought leadership in the field. She has also provided strategic advice to a German ministry on the organizational and methodological aspects of ex-post evaluations of State aid and contributed to research studies for DG Competition.

Linda earned her doctoral degree from LMU Munich and has published extensively in leading international journals, including the International Journal of Industrial Organization, the Journal of Antitrust Enforcement, and the Journal of Competition Law & Economics. Her research spans exclusionary practices, efficiencies in mergers and abuse of dominance cases, price discrimination as well as “pay-for­-delay” settlements in the pharmaceutical sector. Linda regularly shares her expertise at conferences and competition law seminars.

Dr Thomas Hildebrand is a Director in the Berlin office. He has more than 10 years of experience supporting clients across all fields of competition economics, with a particular focus on cartel and information exchange cases (e.g. trucks, air cargo, synthetic rubber), merger proceedings (e.g. RHI/Magnesita, HeidelbergCement/Italcementi, Immonet/Immowelt) and abuse of dominance cases. Thanks to his empirically informed background, Thomas has particular expertise in applying statistical and econometric methods to competition economics cases. His industry experience spans a broad variety of fields including grocery retailing, fast-moving consumer goods, chemicals, cement, refractories, automotive parts, freight forwarding, print/television/online advertising and digital markets. Thomas has worked on cases brought before the European Commission, the German Bundeskartellamt and the Swiss Competition Commission (WEKO) as well as on private litigation matters.

Thomas has been recognized as a Global Elite Thought Leader under 45 in Who’s Who Legal’s Competition Economist Future Leaders category. Prior to joining E.CA Economics, Thomas worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the “Governance and the Efficiency of Economic Systems” Collaborative Research Centre/Transregio 15 programme at Humboldt University of Berlin and as a guest researcher at Deutsche Bundesbank.

Thomas holds a Doctoral degree in Economics from Humboldt University as well as a double Diploma degree in Economics from Humboldt University and the École Nationale de la Statistique et de l’Administration Économique (ENSAE) Paris. In his research Thomas has focussed on two-sided markets and financial economics. His work has been published in leading international peer-reviewed journals such as Management Science, Economics Letters and Research Policy.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here

Dr Simone Kohnz is a Director at E.CA Economics in Berlin. She has 15 years of experience in economic consulting advising clients from a wide range of industries, in all fields of competition policy and across a number of jurisdictions including Germany, the European Union, the UK, and Austria. In recent years, she has specialised in the quantification of damages in private litigation cases. She has advised clients and drafted expert witness reports for European-wide, German and Austrian cartel and information exchange cases in a variety of industries including trucks, payment cards, sugar, bumpers and turntable ladders, district heating, fast-moving consumer goods and de-icing salt. Simone regularly testifies as an economic expert in private litigation court cases.

Furthermore, Simone has considerable experience in mergers; she has managed the economic analysis in a large number of proceedings; including mergers in the fast-moving consumer goods industry (e.g. Rewe/Adeg), automotive supply (e.g. Knorr/Bremse), construction (e.g. H+H/Xella) and cement (e.g. Strabag/Lafarge). Furthermore, she has worked on a number of regulatory cases in telecommunication, transport and pharmaceuticals sectors.

Prior to joining E.CA, Simone was an analyst at the European competition practice at NERA Economic Consulting in London. Simone holds a Doctorate in bargaining theory from the University of Munich.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Alena Kozakova is a Director in the London office. Her focus is competition and economic regulation economics established in public authorities and consulting.

Alena has extensive experience in applied microeconomics, particularly industrial organisation. She has seen a broad variety of cases across industries, with particular emphasis on retail, telecoms, utilities and platform competition. Furthermore, Alena’s focus is on applying competition economics in industries with no history in market organisation such as healthcare, public service broadcasting and education, and on applying regulatory microeconomics and finance.

Prior to joining E.CA, Alena was the Chief Economist of the UK water regulator, Ofwat. She also worked for both predecessors of the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (Office of Fair Trading and the Competition Commission) and for DG Competition within the European Commission. Formerly, Alena also worked for Frontier Economics.

Alena holds a master’s degree in economics from the University of Economics in Prague and from City University in London. Moreover, she holds degrees from the Institute d’études politiques de Paris and the École nationale d’administration.

In addition to her role at E.CA, Alena is a non-executive director on the board of the UK’s Gas and Electricity Markets Authority.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Dr Anselm Mattes is a Director at E.CA Economics in Berlin. He has more than 15 years of experience in economic consulting with a focus on competition economics and empirical analyses. Since 2006, Anselm has provided economic advice to a large range of clients, including the European Commission, several national ministries and authorities as well as many private clients, ranging from start-ups to global players.

In his client-focused work as an economic consultant, Anselm has gained experience in all fields of competition policy. He provides economic advice in merger cases at the national and European level (including feasibility studies in the pre-notification phase). Moreover, he is regularly working on damage assessment related to cartel and information exchange cases, both on the claimant and defendant side. Anselm also supports private clients in abuse of dominance cases, state aid proceedings and regulatory matters.

In addition to his work for private clients, Anselm supports the European Commission with ex-post evaluations and impact assessment studies on various competition policy issues. In this context, he received an Antitrust Writing Award 2024 in the category of business articles on cross-border issues for a Policy Brief on State aid in the rail freight sector.

Anselm’s industry experience comprises a broad variety of sectors, inter alia trucks, automotive supply, steel, nuclear and renewable energies, power cables, forestry industry, music and other copyright industries, public broadcasting, tourism, telecommunication and rail freight.

Before joining E.CA, Anselm worked as a Manager and Senior Researcher at DIW Econ, the consulting firm of the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin). Anselm holds a doctoral degree in economics from the University of Tübingen. In his academic research, Anselm has focused on international economics and foreign direct investment (FDI).

His work has been published in international peer-reviewed journals, such as the Canadian Journal of Economics and Applied Economics Quarterly, as well as in policy-oriented journals like DIW Weekly Report, Wirtschaftsdienst and ifo Schnelldienst.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Dr Nitsche is a director of E.CA Economics and an expert in providing economic advice in competition and litigation cases before the European Commission and national competition authorities in Germany, Austria, the UK and the Netherlands. He has more than 20 years of experience in supporting clients in all fields of competition policy enforcement, including cartel and abuse of a dominant position cases as well as merger control (Phase I and Phase II investigations). In addition, he has advised undertakings on a variety of regulation issues in network industries and several European national governments and State aid recipients in State aid control proceedings. He is named a Global Elite Thought Leader in GCR’s Who’s Who Competition report. Additionally, Dr Nitsche is ranked #1 Competition Economist in Germany by the renowned legal publication JUVE in 2023.

Besides renowned law firms, his clients have also included the European Commission and British, Dutch and German competition and regulatory authorities. Since 2006, he has regularly testified as an expert on merger and litigation cases for the Austrian Cartel Court. Dr Nitsche has conducted overcharge and damage assessments for courts, plaintiffs and defendants in more than twenty cartel matters (e.g. automotive glass, acoustic and thermal isolation products, bearings, beer, chemicals (BBT), cold cuts, de-icing salt, district heating, elevators and escalators, financial products, firefighting vehicles, grocery retail, liquefied petroleum gas, rails, sugar, trucks) and he has advised and testified in more than forty merger proceedings (e.g. Novomatic/Casino Austria, Heidelberg Cement/Italcementi, Telefónica/E-Plus, H3G/O2, Liberty Global/Kabel BW, Strabag/Lafarge, Vattenfall/Nuon, REWE/Adeg, T-Mobile/tele.ring). In addition, he has advised on a number of abuse of dominant position cases in the telecommunications and other network industries.

Prior to his work for E.CA, Dr Nitsche was Vice President in the Competition Practice and Director of the Brussels office of CRA International. Prior to his five years in Brussels, he was an economic consultant at Price Waterhouse and Arthur Andersen in London and Berlin.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Prof. Lars-Hendrik Röller, PhD, is a Director in the Berlin office. Prior to re-joining E.CA in February 2022, Lars-Hendrik Röller served as the chief economic advisor to the former German Federal Chancellor, Angela Merkel, and as the first chief economist with DG Competition at the European Commission. He is a proven expert in industrial economics and has unique expertise in providing economic advice in competition cases. His key topics of interest include the digital, energy, health and transportation markets. Lars-Hendrik Röller is also a professor of economics at the ESMT Berlin.

In July 2011, Lars-Hendrik Röller took up the position as chief economic advisor to former German Federal Chancellor Merkel which he held until December 2021. From 2006 until July 2011, Lars-Hendrik Röller was president of ESMT. In 2007, he co-founded E.CA Economics with Hans W. Friederiszick and Rainer Nitsche. As a senior advisor, Lars-Hendrik Röller advised numerous international companies, governments and international organizations on mergers, cartels, abuse and state aid cases and worked on economic assessments in the fields of antitrust and regulation.

From September 2003 to September 2006, Lars-Hendrik Röller was Chief Economist at DG Competition, European Commission. During that time, he was involved in all phase-two merger cases and many first phase merger cases in front of the European Commission. While Chief Economist, he was also involved in many other high profile antitrust and state aid cases. In addition, as Chief Economist, Professor Roller was actively engaged in a number of policy initiatives including the horizontal merger guidelines revision, the Article 82 2005 staff discussion paper, and the introduction of the new economic approach to state aid control.

Lars-Hendrik Röller’s academic career began in 1983 as a research assistant at the department of economics at the University of Pennsylvania. He then taught as a professor at INSEAD in France and also became director of the research unit for competitiveness and industrial change at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. In 1995, he was appointed professor of industrial economics at Humboldt University in Berlin.

Lars-Hendrik Röller holds a PhD in economics from the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a master of arts in economics and a master of science in artificial intelligence, both from the University of Pennsylvania, and a bachelor of science in computer science from Texas A&M University.

Lars-Hendrik Röller has served as chairman of the German Economic Association and president of the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics (EARIE). He is a fellow of the European Economic Association and a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Dr Alexis Walckiers is a Director in the Brussels office. Before joining E.CA Economics, he was chief economist of the Belgian Competition Authority (BCA) between 2010 and 2020. As chief economist, he sat on the board of the BCA and advised both investigation teams and Competition Colleges on the use of economic tools in competition cases. He has therefore advised on many cases in a range of industries. Alexis also represented the BCA in international fora and served as the president of the Association of Competition Economics. He holds degrees in philosophy and physics, as well as a PhD in economics from the Université Libre de Bruxelles, where he teaches microeconomics to economics and business students. He has published several papers in competition and economic journals, including the Journal of the European Economic Association. Before joining the BCA, he advised the minister of economic affairs on competition issues and has worked for another economics consultancy.

Alexis advises clients in French, Dutch and English across a wide range of competition related issues, including merger filings, abuses of dominance, cartels, damages and state aid. He has worked on cases in many different industries such as retail, telecoms, ports, car distribution, logistics and postal services.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here

Dr Pauline Affeldt is a Manager in the Berlin office. She joined E.CA Economics in February 2022. Pauline previously worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin) and the Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin). Prior to pursuing her doctoral degree, Pauline already worked at E.CA Economics from 2012 to 2014, advising clients in numerous industries, in all fields of competition policy, before the European Commission or national competition authorities, including Germany and Austria.

Pauline has experience advising clients in major merger proceedings (e.g. Telefónica/E-Plus), she has conducted overcharge and damage assessments in private litigation cases following cartel investigations and worked on abuse of dominance projects. Her experience covers a variety of industries including the energy, automotive, pharmaceutical, media, retail and telecommunications sectors.

Pauline holds a doctoral degree in economics from TU Berlin and is a graduate of the Berlin Doctoral Program in Economics & Management Science. She holds a master’s degree in economics from Tilburg University as well as a bachelor’s degree in business administration from both the University of Applied Sciences in Bremen and Euromed Marseille Ecole de Management (now KEDGE Business School). In her research, Pauline has focused on the empirical assessment of competition policy, in particular merger control. Her work has been published in leading journals including the Economic Journal, the International Journal of Industrial Organization, the Journal of Competition Law and Economics, and the Journal of European Competition Law & Practice.

Dr Rafael Aigner is an Associate Principal at E.CA Economics located in Berlin. Rafael provides clients with advice ranging across the field of competition economics. His case experience includes merger proceedings before European and national authorities, litigation proceedings, abuse of dominance and state aid. Among other mandates, he was a testifying expert in an arbitration proceeding in front of the German Arbitration Institute (DIS).

In 2022, Rafael co-authored E.CA’s ex-post evaluation of vertical mergers commissioned by the CMA. On behalf of the European Commission, he worked on a report on the state of competition in the EU, published in 2024. He is also a co-author of a chapter on the economic analysis in European competition law in a legal commentary (NOMOS Kommentar Europäisches Wettbewerbsrecht, 3rd edition). Rafael’s research has been published in academic and applied journals such as Wirtschaftsdienst, Transportation Research, and FinanzArchiv.

Before joining E.CA in April 2017, Rafael worked as a consultant at DIW Econ, where he advised public and corporate clients on a variety of economic matters. From 2012 to 2014, he served as a research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods.

Rafael holds a doctoral degree in Economics from the University of Bonn and is a graduate of the European Doctoral Programme in Quantitative Economics. His thesis was supervised by Martin Hellwig, a former head of the German Monopolies Commission.

Josef Aumüller is an Economist in the Munich office. He joined E.CA Economics in May 2023 and holds a Master’s degree in Economics from LMU Munich. As part of his graduate degree, he spent an academic year at the University of California, Berkeley. During his studies, he specialized in public economics and microeconomics.

His prior work experiences comprise research assistant positions at the University of Munich, the ifo Institute, as well as the Max-Planck-Institute for Innovation and Competition. Before joining as an Economist, he completed internships in competition economics with E.CA and NERA Economic Consulting.

Dr Albert Banal-Estanol is an Associate Professor at Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Affiliated Professor at City University of London, Visiting Professor at College of Europe in Brugge, and research fellow at the IESE Business School and at the DIW Berlin. Previously, he has held teaching and research positions at the University of Western Ontario in Canada, IFP-Energies Nouvelles in France, Northwestern University in the US, the University of Cambridge and London Business School in the UK and the University of Mannheim in Germany. Albert is the director of the MSc in Finance and Banking at UPF and the former director of the MSc in Competition and Regulation at City University of London.

Albert has over 15 years of experience undertaking research, teaching and consultancy in the areas of competition policy, regulation and business strategy. Albert has published more than 20 articles in some of the most prestigious academic journals in the field, such as the Journal of Industrial Economics, the International Journal of Industrial Organisation, Management Science and the Journal of Economics & Management Strategy.

Albert has provided consultancy advice in several competition cases and is a current member of the Academic Panels of the UK’s competition authority, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), and the UK’s energy regulator, the Office for Gas and Electricity Markets (Ofgem). He has also acted as a technical expert for several reports for competition authorities and regulation agencies such as the UK’s OFT and the European Commission’s DG Competition.

Albert has organised and delivered an extensive range of more than 20 professionally-oriented executive training courses for (i) competition authorities and regulators such as Mexico’s CRE (energy) and IFT (telecom) and the UK’s Ofgem (energy), (ii) government agencies such as the UK’s Department of Trade and Industry and the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform and (iii) private companies such as Gaz de France. Albert has also organised and delivered several courses on competition and regulation for regulators across Africa in collaboration with the World Bank, the EU and the African Forum for Utility Regulators.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Brecht Boone has been an Associate Principal in the Brussels office since August 2017. Amongst others, Brecht has worked on several merger proceedings before the European Commission and on several cartel cases. Since October 2023, he is also Professor at the College of Europe in Bruges where he teaches a course on quantitative techniques.

Brecht holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Ghent University where he specialised in the theoretical foundations of labour markets, the evaluation of labour market policies, and the impact of expectation formation on the macroeconomy. He obtained his Master in Economics at Ghent University after completing several advanced courses in microeconomics and econometrics. Brecht has published in the Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization and the Scandinavian Journal of Economics.

Dr Özlem Bedre-Defolie is an Associate Professor (with tenure) of economics. Özlem joined ESMT Berlin in January 2010 as an assistant professor. She received her PhD in economics (with highest distinction) from the Toulouse School of Economics (TSE) in France and also holds an MSc in Economic Theory and Econometrics from TSE. Before moving to Toulouse, Özlem obtained a BA in Economics and a BSc in Mathematics from Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, Turkey.

Before joining ESMT she spent a year in Paris as a postdoctoral research fellow at Ecole Polytechnique, Business Chair. During the first two years of her appointment at ESMT she worked as a part-time visiting scholar in the research department of the Financial Stability Wing of Norges Bank (the central bank of Norway).

Özlem’s research interests are mainly theoretical and applied microeconomics, and industrial organization. In particular, her research focusses on contracts and pricing strategies of platforms, estimation of end user demands in the payment card industry, implications of long-term contracts, multiproduct firm pricing and implications of buyer power in vertical relationships. Her research has been published in leading economics, marketing and industrial organization journals, including American Economic Review, Journal of Economic Theory, American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, Marketing Science, International Journal of Industrial Organization.

Özlem teaches two full-time MBA courses regularly: “Quantitative Methods” and “Competitive and Dynamic Pricing”. She also teaches industrial organization/management science II at the Berlin Doctoral Program in Economics and Management Science (BDPEMS).

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.

Eleonora Cavalera joined E.CA Economics in May 2016 as a Senior Business Administrator and is responsible for the Office management of the Brussels office. She obtained a Bachelor’s degree in business administration in Brussels in 1986.

Before joining E.CA, Eleonora worked as an office manager for various international companies where she was responsible of the smooth running of the offices. Over the years, she has also gained experience in organizing events and in soft and hard HR.

Alessia Ceccarelli joined E.CA Economics in November 2021 and is a Senior Business Administrator in the London office. She has studied English, French and Japanese at the University of Florence and has completed her degree with a two-year exchange program in Nagoya, Japan, in 2013.

Alessia has worked in Italy, Japan and the UK in a variety of fields including IP rights, finance and investment. Her experience has mainly focused on translation, interpreting, working as an executive assistant and other marketing and administrative roles.

James Coates is an Economist in the Brussels Office. He joined E.CA Economics in September 2022. Prior to joining E.CA James completed an internship with Frontier Economics where he worked mostly in the energy sector.

James holds a master’s degree in economics from the Catholic University in Leuven in Belgium and a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Manchester in the UK.

Kai Dahlke joined our Berlin office as a Marketing Manager in October 2023. He holds a degree in sports science with a strong focus on communication from Cologne Sports University.

After completing his traineeship at a Bonn-based business publisher and a three-year stint at the Cologne-based DuMont Media Group, he moved to Berlin. Since then, Kai has been working in marketing and corporate communications for various companies in the IT, healthcare and finance industries.

Dr Juri Demuth is an Associate Principal in the Berlin office. Since joining E.CA Economics first in September 2013, Juri has worked on projects for clients in numerous industries, in all fields of competition policy, before the European Commission or national competition authorities, including Germany and Austria.

Juri has extensive experience advising clients in major merger proceedings (e.g. Telefónica/E-Plus, Lafarge/Holcim, RHI/Magnesita). He has conducted overcharge and damage assessments in private litigation cases following cartel investigations. Furthermore, he has worked on abuse of dominance projects. His experience covers a variety of industries including the telecommunications, refractory, cement, payment card, air cargo, forestry, waste management and fast-moving consumer goods (e.g. meat, flour) sectors.

Juri holds a Doctoral degree in Economics from Freie Universität Berlin and is a graduate of the Berlin Doctoral Program in Economics & Management Science. In his thesis, Juri applied microeconomic theory to questions in the fields of industrial organisation and regulation. Juri additionally obtained a diploma degree in Physics from Freie Universität Berlin.

Dr Nadine Fabritz is a Manager at the Berlin office. She joined E.CA Economics in July 2021. Nadine previously worked at NERA Economic Consulting where she advised clients on a variety of competition cases. From 2010 until 2015, she served as an economist at the Ifo Institute for Economic Research in the Department for Human Capital and Innovation.

Over the course of her career, Nadine has conducted overcharge, damage and passing-on assessments in private litigation cases following cartel investigations. She has provided clients with advice in abuse of dominance cases as well as merger proceedings before the European Commission and the German Bundeskartellamt. Her experience covers a variety of industries including automotive, oilfield services, pharmaceutical, gravure printing, telecommunications and fast-moving consumer goods (e.g. coffee, sugar, or drugstore items).

Nadine holds a doctoral degree in economics from the University of Munich (LMU). In her thesis, she applied econometric methods to analyse determinants of ICT infrastructure as well as their effects on the economy. She also holds a master’s degree in international economics from the University of Göttingen as well as a bachelor’s degree in business management from the Royal Agricultural University in the UK.

Benedikt Flügel is a Manager in the Berlin office. Since joining E.CA Economics in October 2018, Benedikt has advised a range of clients in various fields of competition economics. He has worked on damage and pass-on assessments, analysis in information-exchange and merger cases.

Benedikt holds a master’s degree in economics from Humboldt University of Berlin. His major fields of research were in applied microeconomics and econometrics. Besides his studies, he worked as a tutor for three different chairs at Humboldt University, teaching mathematics, statistics and microeconomics. His educational path also includes an exchange semester at Uppsala University, Sweden. Prior to joining E.CA, Benedikt worked as an Analyst for a private health insurance.

Niklas Gebhard is a Senior Economist in the Brussels office. He joined E.CA Economics in January 2020. Niklas holds a Master’s degree in economics as well as two Bachelor’s degrees in economics and political science from the Ludwig-Maximilians-University (LMU) Munich. As part of his undergraduate degree, Niklas also spent one year at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques (IEP) de Toulouse. During his studies, he specialised in public economics and microeconometrics.

His prior work experiences comprise student research assistant positions at LMU Munich and the Max-Planck-Institute for Public Finance. Niklas further held internship positions in financial risk analysis at the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) and a company that specialises in credit risk methodology.

Marcus Gerlach is a Software Engineer in the Berlin office. He joined E.CA Economics in May 2013. Previously, he worked as a software-engineering project manager and as a software consultant.

Since 2007, Marcus has gained extensive experience as a software engineer, project manager, consultant, database architect, system/database/network administrator and game developer.

He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and Media from the Beuth University of Applied Sciences with a focus on software engineering. In his research, he works on the development of software for a variety of platforms including PCs, smartphones and web servers.

Shahram B.Ghiassi joined the Berlin office of E.CA Economics in June 2019 as an IT Administrator. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Networks Technology Engineering from University of Applied Science & Technology, Tehran, Iran.

He is an experienced IT Admin with a demonstrated history of working in consulting and administration of IT systems.

Lukas Gieser is an Economist in the Munich office. He joined E.CA Economics in May of 2023. Lukas holds a master’s degree in economics from the University of Freiburg, and a bachelor’s degree in economics and political science from the University of Heidelberg. He spent significant portions of both his undergraduate and graduate studies abroad, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Autonomous University of Madrid.

Before joining E.CA as an Economist, Lukas interned at the E.CA Brussels office and at BASF. He also worked as a teaching assistant for an undergraduate statistics and data analysis class. His research interests are economic policy and political economy, as well as topics relating to transportation and mobility.

Paul worked on numerous topics in Industrial Organization and Competition Policy such as input-market bargaining power, merger control, and collusion. Recently, most of his research focuses on the functioning of markets when consumers are partly driven by psychological factors – such as social preferences, loss aversion, time-inconsistency, or naivete – that the classical consumer model abstracts from. He has written on how firms optimally price products and design credit contracts in response to consumers’ psychological tendencies, and investigated the implications thereof for consumer-protection regulation. Furthermore, he studied when profitable consumer exploitation can arise in seemingly competitive markets, and the implications of profitable consumer deception for firms’ innovation incentives. He also reexamined the implications of consumer mistakes for price discrimination, privacy regulation, and the welfare implications of firms collecting more and more data on consumers. Much of his ongoing and planned future research similarly focuses on consumer-protection regulation and imperfect competition driven through or interacting with consumer mistakes. In addition, he studies how individuals with a mis-specified model of the world learn from the feedback they receive.

Paul is a member of the Academic Panel of the Competition and Markets Authority of the UK, a member of the Arbeitskreis Kartellrecht of the German Antitrust Authority (Bundeskartellamt), a Research Fellow of the CEPR Programme in Industrial Organization, a Research Fellow of the CESifo Network in Behavioral Economics, and an elected member of the Industrieökonomischer Ausschuss as well as the Theoretischer Ausschuss of the Verein für Socialpolitik. Currently, he serves as an elected member on the Executive Committee of the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics and as the Vize-Chairperson of the Industrieökonomischer Ausschuss of the Verein für Socialpolitik. His work appeared in leading academic journals such as the American Economic Review, Econometrica, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, and the Review of Economic Studies.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here

Julius Hohberg is a Senior Economist in the Berlin office. He joined E.CA Economics in November 2021. Julius holds a Master’s and a Bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Mannheim. During his studies, he specialised in empirical industrial organisation and applied microeconometrics. As part of his undergraduate degree, Julius spent a semester at the Bocconi University in Milan, Italy.

Prior to joining E.CA as an Economist, Julius also completed an internship with E.CA. Moreover, he interned at the Bundesbank and held a research assistant position at the Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW).

Ariane Jaspert joined the Berlin office of E.CA Economics in April 2018 as a Senior Business Administrator. She has a Diploma in Interpretation and Translation (French/Italian). Before joining E.CA, she worked as an interpreter and translator and also as a manager for an international event management company. There Ariane was responsible for delegate registration and hotel bookings for large medical conferences worldwide.

Malte Jeschonneck is an Senior Economist in the Brussels office. He joined E.CA in September 2021. Malte holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in economics from the Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf. During his studies, he specialised in econometrics and empirical industrial organisation. For his master thesis, he conducted a series of simulations to study the capability of reinforcement learning algorithms to forge collusive schemes.

After completing an internship at E.CA in 2020, he briefly worked as a scientific assistant at the Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE).

Dr Astrid Jung joined E.CA Economics in 2008. Prior to that, she worked for CRA International in Sydney and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). During more than 15 years of experience in the profession, Astrid has built an extensive case experience covering a wide range of industries, competition matters, jurisdictions and clients in Europe, Australia and Asia. Examples of her recent work include private litigation in cartel and information-exchange cases (e.g. trucks, car parts, harbour services, consumer goods), anti-competitive conduct in the shopping centre industry as well as mergers in the construction materials sector. Astrid has testified before the Australian Competition Tribunal.

Astrid holds a PhD from Humboldt University, where she specialised in the field of empirical industrial organization. Her research includes, among others, interconnection in IP networks and the empirical modelling of competition in the early mobile telephony industry. Astrid has published in Telecommunications Policy and in the Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade.

In 2019, W@Competition named Astrid as one of their “40 in their 40s” Notable Women Competition Professionals in Economics.

Dr. Michael Kaiser is a Manager in the Munich office. He joined E.CA Economics in October 2020. Michael has advised numerous clients in merger cases, cartel-related matters and abuse of dominance claims. His experience spans several industries and specifically includes digital platforms, the refining and fuel retail sector and chemical manufacturing.

Dr. Michael Kaiser holds a Doctoral degree in Economics from LMU Munich. His dissertation presented research which employs tools of applied econometrics and machine learning to address questions in labour and development economics.

Prior to that, Michael worked as a research associate at UC San Diego’s Department of Economics for two years. He also holds a Master’s degree in international and development economics from Yale University, and a Bachelor’s in economics from Tilburg University.

Jakub Kałużny is an Associate Principal in the E.CA Berlin office. He joined E.CA Economics in February 2009. He has extensive experience applying both empirical and theoretical economic analysis to antitrust litigation and regulatory matters. His areas of expertise include the evaluation of the competitive effects of mergers, monopolisation and vertical restraints both in the United States and in Europe. His analyses have covered a broad range of industries including consumer goods, health care, agriculture, chemicals and information technology.

Jakub holds a Doctorate from Northwestern University, where he specialised in industrial organization and economic theory.

Prior to joining E.CA, he worked as a senior consultant in the antitrust and environmental and product-liability practices of Bates White, an economic consulting firm based in Washington, D.C.

Previously, he served as a lecturer in the statistics department at Northwestern University.

Tobias Lorenz is an Economist in the Berlin office. He joined E.CA Economics in July 2023. Tobias holds a Master’s degree in economics from the Humboldt University Berlin as well as a Bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Mannheim. During his studies, he focused on General Microeconomics, Econometrics and Environmental Economics.

Prior to joining E.CA as an Economist, Tobias completed an internship at E.CA, as well as at Deutsche Bundesbank. He also held research assistant positions at the DIW Berlin and the ZEW Mannheim.

Prof Martin Lutzenberger joined E.CA Economics in 2019. He has many years of experience in applied research and consulting in the fields of competition economics and regulation. His work includes benchmark studies for regulatory authorities, antitrust and antitrust damages cases as well as the assessment and evaluation of mergers.

After his studies in Economics at the University of Freiburg i.Br., he obtained a Doctoral degree from the University of Zurich. His doctoral thesis focused on the tension between regulation and innovation and was evaluated with “summa cum laude”. Throughout the following years, Martin was active as a project manager, senior research associate and lecturer at the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and University of Zurich. He then held the position of project manager and head of the Berlin office for a leading Swiss consultancy firm in the field of regulation and competition.

Furthermore, Martin is a professor of Economics at the renowned “BSP Business School Berlin”.

Dr. Jan Malek joined E.CA Economics in July 2022 and is a Manager in the Berlin office.

Jan obtained his PhD from KU Leuven and DIW Berlin in November 2022, specialising in empirical Industrial Organisation and Innovation. His dissertation examines the drivers and effects of acquisitions of R&D projects in the pharmaceutical industry, and considers both the product market and technology aspects of transactions. It also investigates the relationship of venture capital funds and kill zones in the innovation landscape. Jan’s research was funded by a grant from the Research Foundation Flanders.

Jan has gained case experience in a range of industries (for example energy, insurance and reinsurance, telecoms, construction) and supports clients in merger proceedings, abuse of dominance cases, state-aid proceedings, and follow-on damage litigations.

Before joining E.CA, Jan held several part time roles alongside his research work. He worked as a Competition Economist in a Czech law firm, advising clients on RPM issues. On the team of a monitoring trustee, he supervised the implementation of a complex merger remedy package. Together with Masaryk University in Brno, he spoke in court as an economic expert in a litigation proceeding in the Czech Republic. In 2020/2021, he was a Bluebook Trainee in the team of the Chief Economist of DG COMP, where he worked on a complex merger case and was involved in several policy projects. Last but not least, he interned at E.CA in 2018.

Jan holds a Master’s degree in Economics from the University of Amsterdam (with a specialisation Markets and Regulation), and a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Charles University in Prague.

Elene Mchedlishvili joined the Berlin office of E.CA Economics in November 2023. In her role, she supports management in financial reporting, planning, performance, and control.

Elene holds a Bachelor’s degree in International Business Administration from the European University of Viadrina, as well as a Master’s degree in Economics from Humboldt University of Berlin. Her studies also included exchange semesters at the University of Porto and the University of Maastricht.

Before joining E.CA, she gained professional experience as a student at various companies, primarily focusing on tasks related to accounting, finance, and project-controlling.

Daniela Nunes is a Human Resources Assistant in the Brussels office. She joined E.CA Economics in August 2023.
Daniela has a strong background in administrative and human resources roles, and before joining E.CA she gained valuable experience during her traineeship at the European Parliament.

Daniela is currently completing a master’s degree in Economics and Human Resources Management. Prior to this, she obtained her bachelor’s degree in Public Administration in Portugal, which included a semester at the University of Łódź in Poland.

Alexander Paul is a Manager in the Berlin office. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Mannheim and joined E.CA Economics in September 2020.

Alexander has many years of experience in empirical economic research. Prior to joining E.CA he worked as an Assistant Professor at the University of Aarhus, Denmark. His research, which centres on applied econometric work in the economics of human development and health economics, has been published in leading journals.

Giulio Pietrobelli is an Economist in the Berlin office. He joined E.CA Economics in September 2022. Giulio holds a Master’s degree in Economics from the Barcelona School of Economics as well as a Bachelor degree in Business Administration and Economics from the University of Rome Tor Vergata.

Before joining E.CA, Giulio interned at Arthur D. Little where he specialised in Spectrum Auctions. He also completed an internship at the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), where he worked on a happiness economics related project.

Raphaël Poncet is a Senior Economist in the Brussels office. He joined E.CA Economics in April 2021. Raphaël holds a double Bachelor’s degree in Economics and Law as well as a double Master’s degree in Economics and Business Law from the Toulouse School of Economics. During his studies, he specialised in industrial organisation and focused on competition related topics.

Prior to joining E.CA, Raphaël was a teacher assistant in microeconomics at the Toulouse School of Economics. He also completed an internship with E.CA.

Paul Püplichhuisen is an Economist in the Brussels office. He joined E.CA in January 2024. Paul holds a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Bayreuth and a Master’s degree in Economics from the Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf. During his studies, he specialised in econometrics, energy economics and competition in digital markets. For his master thesis, he conducted simulation experiments to study the capability of self-learning pricing algorithms to forge collusive schemes and compared algorithmic behaviour to human behaviour.

Paul worked as a student assistant at Fraunhofer FIT in Bayreuth and as a scientific assistant at the Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE), where he is currently an external PhD candidate. Further, he has also had internships at E.CA Economics in 2021, Lademann & Associates in 2020, and Deutsche Telekom in 2018.

Luca Rancati is an Economist in the Brussels office and joined E.CA Economics in March 2020.

He holds a Double degree Master in economics from the University of Milan and Université catholique de Louvain. During his studies, Luca specialised in Industrial organisation, Competition policy and Regulation. Prior to this, he completed a Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy from the University of Milan.

Before joining E.CA, Luca interned in an Italian economic consultancy, where he worked on cases related to the Energy and Telecommunications sectors.

Dr Michael Rauber is an Associate Principal in the Berlin office. He joined E.CA Economics in December 2014. Since that time, he has worked on numerous competition-economics cases related to cartels, mergers and antitrust law. In particular, he has provided extensive advice to clients on cartel-related matters and follow-on litigation in a wide range of industries including the sugar, trucking, payment instrument and window-fitting sectors.

Before joining the E.CA team, Michael served for three years on the chief economist’s team at the United Kingdom’s Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) and was assistant director of the CMA’s research and evaluation unit. Prior to these activities, he worked as a PricewaterhouseCoopers consultant in London and Berlin, advising clients on a wide range of economic issues, with a particular focus on econometric analysis. Michael holds a Doctoral degree from the University of Konstanz with a focus on empirical economics.

Jörg Rocholl has been the president of ESMT since July 2011. He joined ESMT in July of 2007 as an associate professor. In July 2010 he was promoted to professor and awarded the first EY Chair in Governance and Compliance, which he held until June 2019. In September 2010 he was named as the associate dean of faculty and in April 2011, dean of faculty. Jörg holds both his PhD in Finance and Economics and his MPhil from Columbia Business School and received his “Diplom-Ökonom mit Auszeichnung” (Economics degree with distinction) from the Witten/Herdecke University in Germany.

Jörg’s research interests are in the areas of Corporate Finance, Corporate Governance, and Financial Intermediation. His research has been accepted for publication in leading academic journals such as the Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics, and the Review of Financial Studies.

Jörg is the vice-chair of the economic advisory board of the German Federal Ministry of Finance and also the vice chairman of the economic advisory board of Deutsche Welle. He is also a research professor at the Ifo Institute in Munich and Duisenberg Fellow of the European Central Bank (ECB). He has worked with Boston Consulting Group in Frankfurt and London and Deutsche Bank in Frankfurt and New York. Furthermore, he has been a visiting researcher at the Bundesbank’s Economic Research Center in Frankfurt. Jörg received the Distinguished CESifo Affiliate Award and was awarded the Lamfalussy Fellowship from the European Central Bank. He has received several research grants from Columbia Business School, Kenan-Flagler Business School, and the FDIC; the Weatherspoon Teaching Award at Kenan-Flagler Business School; and a grant from the Westphal Foundation to conduct research in Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong.

Jörg’s research has been portrayed in leading international media such as New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Financial Times, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Handelsblatt, and Börsen-Zeitung. He appears regularly as an expert on ARD, ZDF, and Deutsche Welle TV.

A detailed CV can be downloaded here.