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Digital Competition Conference 2026

At the Digital Competition Conference 2026, cutting-edge research will meet policy on the most pressing digital market competition issues of our time.

In-person and Livestreamed

Georgetown University – Capitol Campus

Co-Sponsors

Yale Tobin Center’s Digital Economy Project, Princeton University’s Center for Information Technology Policy (CITP)

The Knight-Georgetown Institute (KGI), the Yale Tobin Center’s Digital Economy Project, and Princeton University’s Center for Information Technology Policy (CITP) are pleased to co-host the Digital Competition Conference 2026 (DCC) in Washington, D.C. The DCC is an annual gathering where researchers, policymakers, businesses, litigators, and civil society experts explore the latest lessons, challenges, and opportunities in regulating and enforcing competition in digital markets.

Hardly a day passes without competition regulation or enforcement involving tech companies appearing in news headlines. With digital platforms increasingly shaping how we search, communicate, transact, and interact online, the importance of effective competition policy has never been greater. The Digital Competition Conference is where research meets policy, providing a forum for evidence-based dialogue and a shared understanding of real-world regulatory and enforcement lessons, challenges, and opportunities for competition in digital markets.

From groundbreaking research to emerging enforcement actions, the 2026 program will address pressing issues in digital markets. Sessions will feature a mix of researchers, policy experts, and practitioners covering topics including:

  • Search and ad tech
  • Privacy, security, and competition
  • App store competition
  • Content, AI, and antitrust
  • Innovation and disruption
  • Antitrust theories of harm in AI
  • Building on recent antitrust wins
  • International regulatory developments
  • Institutional design

DCC 2026 Agenda (Preliminary)

February 5, 2026
8:15-9:00 Breakfast
9:00-9:15 Welcome
9:15-10:00 Keynote: Prof. Julian Wright, National University of Singapore
10:00-11:15 Content, AI, and Antitrust

  • Madhavi Singh, Yale Law School
  • Martin D’Halluin, NewsCorp
  • Courtney Radsch, Open Markets Institute
  • Alexander Feder Cooper, Yale University
  • Additional panelist TBA

Moderator: Alissa Cooper, Knight-Georgetown Institute
11:15-11:40 Break
11:40-12:45 International Regulatory Developments

  • Gunn Jiravuttipong, UC Berkeley Law
  • Vikas Kathuria, BML Munjal University
  • Sangyun Lee, Kyoto University
  • Additional panelist TBA

Moderator: Filippo Lancieri, Georgetown Law
12:45-2:05 Lunch

Panel: Institutional Design (1:00-1:50)

  • Felix Styma, iConomy & Innovate Europe Foundation
  • Additional panelists TBA

Moderator: David Hyman, Georgetown Law
2:05-3:45 Privacy, Security, and Competition

  • “Security vs. Interoperability” Arguments: A Technical Framework (Daji Landis, New York University)
  • Anonymizing search click-and-query data while maintaining utility (Joe Jerome, DuckDuckGo)
  • Competition and Privacy (Yifei Wang, University of Pittsburgh School of Business)
  • The PET Paradox: How Amazon Instrumentalises PETs in Sidewalk to Entrench Its Infrastructural Power (Thijmen van Gend, TNO & Delft University of Technology)

Discussant: Joe Calandrino, Carnegie Mellon University
3:45-4:00 Break
4:00-5:30 Nuances of market participant behavior

  • Contestability and the Optimal Regulation of Social Media Platforms (Miguel Risco, Bocconi University)
  • App Store Competition (Gaston Llanes, Catholic University of Chile)
  • Sherlocking: The Effect of Platform-owner Entry on the Competitive Behavior of Third-party Firms (Ben Leyden, Cornell University)
  • Exclusionary effects of incentive schemes: platform rewards and multi-homing in ride hailing (Sean Ennis, University of East Anglia)

Discussant: TBA
5:30-7:00 Poster Session
February 6, 2026
8:15-9:00 Breakfast
9:00-9:45 Keynote: TBA
9:45-11:00 Building on Recent Antitrust Wins

  • Panelists TBA
11:00-11:20 Break
11:20-12:30 Search and Ad Tech

  • Gatekeepers and Self-Preferencing: Incentives and Welfare Trade-offs in Two-sided Markets (Muxin Li, Fudan University)
  • Who benefits from Google’s SERP? The impact of the DMA on the Air Travel Market (Joan Calzada, University of Barcelona)
  • Beyond Search: How LLMs Reshape Users’ Information Seeking and Consumption Behavior Evidence from an Online Field Experiment (Cristiana Firullo, Cornell University)

Discussant: Chiara Farronato, Harvard University
12:30-1:30 Lunch

Lightning talks from poster presenters
1:30-1:55 Innovation and Antitrust

  • Innovation Ecosystems in Antitrust (Ketan Ahuja, Harvard Kennedy School)

Discussant: Chris Riley, Data Transfer Initiative
1:55-3:15 Artificial Intelligence

  • What if disruption really happens – are competition law and digital regulation fit for a new era of AI-driven competition? (Jan-Frederick Goehsl, University of Muenster)
  • Innovation or Infringement? Generative AI and the Potential for Exclusionary Abuse under Article 102 TFEU (Todd Davies, University College London)
  • Additional panelist TBA

Discussant: TBA
3:15-3:40 Break
3:40-4:50 Interactive Session: AI Antitrust Theory of Harm

Led by Jonathan Kanter, Carnegie Mellon & Washington University St. Louis
4:50-5:10 Close

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