News and developments
Ms. Çiğdem Gizem Okkaoğlu; Former Competition Expert / Rapporteur of the Turkish Competition Authority; joins ELIG Gürkaynak Attorneys-at-Law.
ELIG Gürkaynak Attorneys-at-Law is proud to announce that Ms. Çiğdem Gizem Okkaoğlu has joined its competition law team of 48 specialized competition lawyers as of the beginning of September 2021.
Ms. Okkaoğlu holds a BS degree in Industrial Engineering from Bilkent University (2015), a BA degree in Economics from Anadolu University (2018) and an LLB (Law) from Ankara University (2019). She is currently working on her LLM degree in Private Law at Ankara University.
Ms. Okkaoğlu has worked in the Turkish Competition Authority for about four and a half years between 2016 and 2020 as a competition expert and rapporteur, and she was working at an international law firm until now since her departure from the TCA in 2020. She took part in numerous dawn raids and dealt with many antitrust cases as a case handler, which included various types of horizontal and vertical agreements, abuse of dominance claims, and exemptions / negative clearance applications for cases such as Roche - Novartis, wheat flour, fertilizer, meal cards, Ankara orthodontic instruments and Henkel. She also handled complex domestic and international merger cases including Phase I and II analyses with remedies, such as Lesaffre - Dosu. She has worked on various legislative instruments with regard to competition advocacy issues, such as the laws and public implementations on retailers / waste / food card sectors.
Following her departure from the Turkish Competition Authority in 2020 after four and a half years of service at the Turkish Competition Authority, she was working in the competition law and regulation department of an international law firm in Turkey.
Ms. Okkaoğlu has published numerous papers in national and international publications as below and is a frequent speaker at national and international conferences:
ELIG Gürkaynak Attorneys-at-Law is confident that Ms. Çiğdem Gizem Okkaoğlu will be an invaluable addition to its specialized competition law team.
Gönenç Gürkaynak, Esq.,
Founding Partner
On behalf of ELIG Gürkaynak Attorneys-at-Law