Profile details
About Jenn Mellott
Jenn is jointly based in our Brussels and Washington DC offices, and advises clients on multi-national transactions and other competition matters.
Jenn’s dual location makes her exceptionally well placed to advise on a range of US, EU and international antitrust law issues. She advises on all aspects of US and EU competition law, including merger control, antitrust compliance counselling, antitrust litigation and behavioural investigations. She has extensive experience representing clients in complex Second Request and Phase II merger control proceedings and cartel investigations in the US, EU, and UK.
Jenn has experience advising clients in various industry sectors, including pharmaceutical and life sciences, telecommunications, technology, industrials, and financial institutions.
Jenn joined Freshfields in Washington in 2012. She was resident in Freshfields’ Hong Kong office in the second half of 2012 and has been jointly based on Washington and Brussels since 2018.
Jenn was a member of the Competition Law360 Editorial Board in 2020 and has authored articles on various antitrust and competition topics for Concurrences, the Antitrust Bulletin, and the ABA Antitrust Magazine. She also developed and hosts Freshfields’ Competition podcast, Essential Antitrust. Jenn has been recognised in Law Business Research’s Competition Future Leaders guide for the past 4 years.
Recent work
- AstraZeneca on global merger control clearances for its pending $39bn acquisition of Alexion.
- Aon on global merger control clearances for its pending $80bn all-stock combination with Willis Towers Watson;
- Siemens on European and global merger control clearances for its proposed $16bn transformative combination of its mobility business with Alstom.
- Starbucks on global merger control and ongoing competition compliance aspects of its $7.15bn global coffee alliance with Nestle.
- KLX, Inc., a US aerospace parts distributor, on global merger control aspects of its $4.2bn acquisition by Boeing, which combined one of the largest aerospace parts distributors globally with the leading manufacturer of commercial airplanes.
- Rexam, a leading global beverage can manufacturer, on global merger control clearances for its $6.9bn takeover by US rival Ball Corporation, which brought together the world’s two largest producers of aluminium beverage cans.
- London Stock Exchange Group on its $1.6bn rights issue to fund its $2.7bn acquisition of Russell Investments.
- Continental, the German auto- and truck-parts manufacturing company, on its $1.6bn acquisition of Ohio-based rubber and plastics company Veyance Technologies from private equity firm Carlyle Group.
- A global investment bank in a collection of regulatory and criminal investigations into allegations of a conspiracy among the world’s largest banks to manipulate the setting of the Libor and other leading benchmark interest rates, in connection with which Jenn spent six months working from Freshfields’ Hong Kong office.
Qualifications
Education
- Georgetown University Law Center, US (JD, magna cum laude)
- Boston University, US (BA in political science, philosophy and economics)
Professional qualifications
- Admitted to practise in New York and the District of Columbia, US
- Admitted to the Brussels Bar (B List)