Hubs
"Joe Ostoyich has to be the best-qualified competition law attorney we have ever worked with. He has spent countless hours over the years learning our business and it shows in the quality of the advice he provides." "The consummate consigliere in terms of client service" and "an outstanding trial lawyer," with "excellent recall, in-depth knowledge and exceptionally good judgment," he is "one of the best antitrust counselors," "a very effective and a strong strategist," and can "distill matters clearly and is an incredible advocate."
Chambers USA 2015, 2018, 2019, 2021; The Legal 500 2017, 2021
Mr. Ostoyich is a senior partner, recently completed two terms as a member of the firmwide Executive Committee, and also served for a number of years as chair of the firm's Litigation Department in Washington, D.C. He was recently recognized for “excellence among American litigation and trial counsel” and inducted as a Fellow into the Litigation Counsel of America (2022), an invitation-only trial lawyer honorary society limited to 3,500 lawyers (less than 0.5%) nationwide.
He has been lead trial counsel in dozens of antitrust matters, and has more than thirty years of experience representing some of the world's leading companies in bet-the-company price fixing and monopolization litigation in U.S. courts, including more than two dozen clusters of consolidated class action cases, and in merger and non-merger investigations.
His clients over the years have included a roster of Fortune 500, Global 1000, and large private companies, including Allied Beverage, Ashland, AT&T, BHP Billiton, Breakthru Beverage, Brown-Forman, Caterpillar, Colfax, Eaton, Energy Transfer, ExxonMobil, Imperial Chemical Industries, Ingevity, Ingram Industries, Intel, JSW Steel, McWane, MeadWestvaco, Olin, Patterson Companies, and WestRock. Mr. Ostoyich’s defense-side efforts in the courtroom and in government investigations continue to receive accolades in competition and legal circles. He was one of only ten lawyers worldwide nominated as 2020 Litigator of the Year in the Global Competition Review. In 2019, he was, similarly, one of only 10 antitrust lawyers nationwide (and 385 lawyers total) to be named a BTI Client Service All-Star, and he has repeatedly received high rankings from Chambers USA, The Legal 500, Martindale-Hubbell, and D.C. Super Lawyer. In 2014 and 2015, Mr. Ostoyich and his trial team were named "Legal Lions" in Law360's Weekly Verdict: Legal Lions & Lambs (February 14, 2014) and won the award for Behavioral Matter of the Year- Americas by the Global Competition Review (April 14, 2015) for their work on a matter resulting in a defense verdict as lead trial counsel in an eight-week bench trial against the Federal Trade Commission on charges that his client conspired to fix prices directly and through an industry association. The Commission's decision to dismiss six of its own counts marked the first time in two decades that the Commission ruled against its own claims.
Additional trial verdicts include receiving a zero-dollar judgment on behalf of a client facing a multibillion-dollar monopolization suit brought by its main rival.
Mr. Ostoyich received summary judgment in a price fixing case charging his client, ExxonMobil, with participating in a decade-long conspiracy to fix natural gas prices, and the dismissal and denial of class certification in a long-running set of direct and indirect purchaser monopolization and conspiracy class actions. In all three cases, his cross examination of the opposing experts led the courts to exclude or disregard their testimony.
Mr. Ostoyich received dismissals on the pleadings in numerous other antitrust cases, including dismissal of three lawsuits challenging the AT&T-Time Warner merger under the antitrust laws, and class action and individual cases against Ashland, Patterson Companies, and Olin, among others.
Mr. Ostoyich also represents parties in merger and non-merger investigations by the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, the European Commission and government authorities around the world. He most recently closed a DOJ investigation into a client's alleged "no-poaching" conduct, a DOJ investigation into a major telecommunications company’s participation in an industry wide standard setting effort, an FTC investigation into an alleged group boycott, and a state Attorney General investigation into price fixing, all with no enforcement actions. On the merger side of his practice, he represented Ingevity Corporation in its acquisition of Georgia Pacific's pine chemicals business before the FTC and competition authorities around the world, MeadWestvaco Corporation in a worldwide clearance for its $16 billion merger with RockTenn Corporation, and significant third-parties in a number of matters, including Constellation Brands’ sale of certain wine and spirits product lines to Gallo.
He is a member of the Antitrust Council of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and regularly speaks at industry conferences and client retreats about antitrust law developments. He has written and edited several dozen articles and analyses of the antitrust laws and co-authored a chapter on the law and economics of antitrust damages in a leading treatise.