Rita Leitão

Blue Book Trainee at Directorate General Competition (DG COMP) - European Commission

October 2022 - Present • Brussels, Belgium

Traineeship in the Mergers unit of DG COMP dealing with energy, environment and automotive cases. Actively participated in different Phase I, Phase II and simplified proceedings. In each case, I have performed tasks of exchanging correspondence and attending conference calls with the parties concerned and with third parties, drafting the minutes of those calls, drafting relevant documents (NCOM, Annex 7, midday express, parts of decisions), preparing presentations on the cases, attending unit and team meetings and meetings with the hierarchy and national competition authorities and conducting legal research on precedents and policy issues. Furthermore, I have had the opportunity to witness the synergies with different services (legal services, chief economist team) and DGs, giving me a holistic perspective of each merger case. I have also attended in-depth training on mergers and antitrust, which allowed me to develop both my procedural and theoretical expertise in these fields and my overall knowledge of the functioning of the Commission.