The Stanford Computational Antitrust project announces that the COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission (CCCC) has joined the project as a partner agency. The cooperation establishes a working relationship between the regional competition authority of the COMESA and the research program hosted at Stanford CodeX.

The COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission operates across a regional market composed of countries in Eastern, Northern, Central, and Southern Africa, including Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Egypt, Libya, Sudan, Tunisia, Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Seychelles, Burundi, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, Uganda, Eswatini, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The jurisdiction covers a large economic space in which competition policy plays an increasing role in market integration and economic development.

The collaboration between the COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission and the Stanford Computational Antitrust project will focus on the study and practical deployment of computational tools in competition enforcement. The two institutions will work together in the coming weeks and months to examine how data analysis and artificial intelligence can assist the agency in detecting anticompetitive conduct or monitoring markets.

Thibault Schrepel, creator and director of the Stanford Computational Antitrust project, said: “Competition enforcement has entered a new phase in which computation is becoming essential. Partnering with the COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission creates a unique opportunity to experiment with related approaches in a large and diverse economic region. We look forward to working closely together to generate new insights and help shape the future of competition enforcement.”

The Stanford Computational Antitrust project looks forward to a sustained collaboration with the COMESA Competition and Consumer Commission and to supporting new initiatives aimed at strengthening competition enforcement across the COMESA region.