The article "How Mergers Affect Innovation: Theory and Evidence" by Prof. Dr. Justus Haucap by  Alexander Rasch, Joel Stiebale and Justus Haucap was honored with the Antitrust Writing Award. The article analyses how horizontal mergers affect innovation of the merged entity and its non-merging competitors. Using data on horizontal mergers among pharmaceutical firms in Europe and applying propensity score matching estimators, it can be shown, that average patenting and R&D of the merged entity and its rivals declines substantially in post-merger periods.

Der Antitrust Writing Award is presented once a year by Concurrences Review and George Washington University Law School Competition Law Center and honors the best article of the year in the fields antitrust and mergers.