Key takeaways:

• Brazil’s new Competition Law (12.529/2011) came into force on May 29, 2012, effecting a comprehensive institutional and procedural overhaul of the Brazilian merger control system.
• Notification is mandatory for transactions where one of the groups involved had gross revenues in Brazil exceeding BRL 750 million (approximately USD 375 million) and the other had gross revenues in Brazil exceeding BRL 75 million (approximately USD 37.5 million).
• The new suspensory regime combined with a lengthy review period of up to 330 days turn Brazil into a priority jurisdiction when assessing antitrust risk from both a substantive and timing perspective.