SAUDI ARABIA Law and Practice Contributed by: Alex Saleh, Asad Ahmad, Khaled al-Khashab and Shahad Al-Humaidani, GLA & Company
The 90-day regulatory review period will begin on the date the GAC notifies the applicant that the notification submission is complete. If the last day of this regulatory review period corre - sponds to an official holiday, the next subse - quent working day will be considered the last day of the regulatory review period. The regulatory review period may be suspended in specific circumstances. • When the GAC requests any information or documents from the applicants, it may suspend the regulatory review period from the date when it requests the information or documents to the date the applicant provides the requested information or documents. • When the GAC finds that the economic concentration parties or their representatives have provided incorrect information or failed to submit available information to the GAC within the prescribed period. Where the regulatory review period is suspend - ed, the days during which it is suspended are not counted as part of the 90-day regulatory review period. 2.13 Penalties for the Implementation of a Transaction Before Clearance Where an economic concentration must be noti - fied to the GAC, it is a violation of the KSA Com - petition Law for the transaction to be completed unless the participating parties have received the GAC’s approval in writing (see 2.12 Requirement for Clearance Before Implementation ). With respect to the penalties implemented and their publication see 2.2 Failure to Notify . The GAC’s 2022 annual report does not indicate that any of the penalties imposed were with respect
to parties who had implemented the transaction before the GAC’s clearance. 2.14 Exceptions to Suspensive Effect Exemption The GAC’s board of directors has the authority under Article 8 of the KSA Competition Law and Chapter 7 of the Executive Regulations to pro - vide a party or parties with an exemption that will exclude the KSA Competition Law from being applied to a specific transaction or economic concentration. The exemption will be granted if it will lead to improved market performance or improve the performance of undertakings in terms of the quality of the product or technologi - cal development, creative efficiency or both. The benefit of the exemption to the consumer should outweigh the effects of restricting the freedom of competition. An application for exemption under this mecha - nism must be made and will be considered by the GAC if the application: • is made in the format and on the forms speci - fied under the Executive Regulations; • provides adequate justification for the appli - cation; • includes sufficient evidence of the positive results envisaged from the economic concen - tration; and • provides supporting documents and any other information that the GAC requires to review the application. The board may, upon the recommendation of the technical committee, approve the application if the exemption will: • lead to improving the market or undertakings’ performance in terms of quality, diversifica -
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