A Tale of Two Sides: Sabre/Farelogix in the United States and the UK

Abstract

On 14 November 2018, Sabre Corporation announced that it had reached agreement to acquire Farelogix Inc. for $360 million. On 20 August 2019, the US Department of Justice (‘DOJ’) filed a civil antitrust lawsuit seeking to block the transaction.1 At this time, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (‘CMA’) continued its review of the proposed transaction. Following a two-week trial in January and February 2020, the United States District Court for the District of Delaware (the ‘US Court’) issued its Opinion on 7 April 2020, denying the DOJ’s request to block the merger, stating that ‘DOJ has failed to meet its burden of proof’.2 Shortly thereafter, on April 9, the CMA issued its final report, detailing its decision to prohibit the deal and concluding that it ‘may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition’.3 The parties abandoned the deal on 1...