How ACCC Merger Review Works in Australia (2026): Mandatory Notification, Thresholds, Timelines and Practical Steps for M&A

Merger review in Australia is the process by which the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) assesses whether a proposed acquisition or merger would substantially lessen competition in a market.  For deal teams, the practical questions are simple: do we notify, when do we engage and how long will it take?  Since 1 January 2026 those questions have had statutory answers.  Australia’s mandatory and suspensory merger control regime, introduced by the Treasury Laws Amendment (Mergers and Acquisitions Reform) Act 2024 (Cth) and now contained in Part IVA of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth), requires acquisitions meeting prescribed thresholds to be notified to the ACCC and prohibits them from being put into effect until the ACCC approves them.  Voluntary use of the new system was possible from 1 July 2025.  Once a notification takes effect, the ACCC has 30 business days to complete a Phase 1 assessment and, if the acquisition is referred to Phase 2, a further 90 business days.

This guide sets out the statutory basis, the notification thresholds, an eight-step notification process, the documents the ACCC expects, the statutory timetable, the filing fees and what the first year of operation tells in-house counsel and corporate development teams about how the regime is actually being applied.

Overview: what ACCC merger review is and who it affects

The ACCC merger review Australia framework exists to protect competition in Australian markets.  It applies to acquisitions of shares or assets that may affect the structure of a market, whether the buyer is a domestic corporate, a private equity sponsor or a foreign investor, and it reaches foreign-to-foreign acquisitions where the target is connected with Australia and the thresholds are met.

Australia has moved from a longstanding voluntary and informal clearance model to a mandatory and suspensory administrative regime.  The ACCC stopped accepting new informal clearance requests from 1 October 2025 and the formal merger authorisation pathway has gone.  For any acquisition put into effect on or after 1 January 2026, Part IVA is the only route.

Deal teams should treat merger review as a core workstream, not as an afterthought, because clearance risk directly affects deal certainty, timing, cost and contract drafting – and because a notifiable acquisition completed without approval is void, not merely unlawful.

Statutory basis

Merger control in Australia sits within the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth).  Section 50 continues to prohibit acquisitions that would have the effect, or be likely to have the effect, of substantially lessening competition in any market, but it no longer applies to a notified acquisition: notified acquisitions are decided administratively by the ACCC under Part IVA rather than by the Federal Court.  That is the single most important structural change.  Under the former regime, the ACCC had to persuade a court that an acquisition would substantially lessen competition; under Part IVA, the parties must persuade the regulator, within a fixed timetable, on the material they put before it.

The 2024 reforms also inserted a new section 50(3), which confirms that an acquisition may substantially lessen competition if it would have the effect, or be likely to have the effect, of creating, strengthening or entrenching a substantial degree of power in the market.  The ACCC treats this as an elucidation of the existing test rather than a new one, but it invites a market-power framing that a submission should meet directly.  The notification thresholds, filing fees and much of the procedural detail are set by the Competition and Consumer (Notification of Acquisitions) Determination 2025, as amended with effect from 1 April 2026.

The ACCC administers and enforces the regime and publishes its analytical approach in its Merger Assessment Guidelines (June 2025) and its procedural approach in its Merger Process Guidelines.  Because the test is forward-looking and economic in nature, the ACCC assesses the likely competitive effects of a transaction against a counterfactual – the state of competition with and without the acquisition – rather than applying a rigid market-share cut-off.  “Likely” means a real commercial likelihood; it does not mean more probable than not.

When the ACCC takes an interest

The ACCC is most likely to scrutinise transactions where the parties compete directly, where a supplier acquires a customer (or vice versa) or where a deal removes a maverick or emerging competitor.  The regulator also monitors sectors of strategic public interest – supermarkets, fuel, healthcare, financial services, digital platforms and infrastructure – and may examine transactions in those markets even where the parties consider the competitive overlap modest.  The first half of 2026 bore this out: fuel retailing, supermarkets, motor vehicle dealerships, veterinary services and insurance accounted for a disproportionate share of the matters taken beyond a routine Phase 1 review. 

Deal teams should assume that any transaction with a meaningful horizontal overlap or vertical relationship in a concentrated market warrants an early competition assessment, in addition to checking whether the transaction meets the mandatory notification thresholds.  The two questions are independent: an acquisition can be notifiable and entirely benign or, alternatively, below every threshold and genuinely problematic.

Eligibility: which transactions must be notified

Notification is mandatory where an acquisition meets a threshold set by the Competition and Consumer (Notification of Acquisitions) Determination 2025.  A notifiable acquisition must not be put into effect until the ACCC approves it.

The principal tests are:

Large merged firm test.	Combined Australian revenue of the acquirer group and the target of at least $200 million and either target Australian revenue of at least $50 million or a global transaction value of at least $250 million.
Very large acquirer test	Acquirer group Australian revenue of at least $500 million and target Australian revenue of at least $10 million.
Serial or creeping acquisitions	A 3-year look-back aggregates acquisitions of the same or substitutable goods or services against the $50 million and $10 million limbs, with carve-outs for acquisitions already notified and for targets below $2 million.
Asset and voting-power thresholds	From 1 April 2026, separate thresholds apply to acquisitions of assets that are not a whole business and to acquisitions that cross specified voting-power lines.
Designated supermarket acquirers	Coles and Woolworths must notify all supermarket acquisitions, and specified land acquisitions, regardless of the monetary thresholds.

The consequences of getting this wrong are severe.  An acquisition put into effect in breach of the notification obligation is void and the maximum civil penalty is the greater of:

• $100 million;
• 3 times the value of the benefit obtained; or
• 30% of adjusted turnover during the breach period.

Pre-completion coordination between competitors can also be cartel conduct in its own right.

Where a transaction does not meet the mandatory thresholds, deal teams should still screen it against the substantive competition test in section 50 and a set of practical indicia, because the ACCC retains the ability to take a below-threshold acquisition to the Federal Court.  The right question combines “must we notify under the thresholds?” with “could this deal substantially lessen competition?”

Horizontal vs vertical vs conglomerate concerns

• Horizontal overlaps. The parties supply substitutable products or services in the same market.  These raise the highest risk because the transaction directly removes a competitor and increases concentration.
• Vertical relationships. The parties operate at different levels of the same supply chain, for example, a manufacturer acquiring a distributor.  Concerns arise where the merged firm could foreclose rivals’ access to inputs or customers.
• Conglomerate effects. The parties supply complementary or unrelated products.  Concerns are less common but can arise through bundling, tying or portfolio effects that entrench market power.

Notification waivers

Where an acquisition meets a threshold but plainly raises no competition issue, the parties can apply for a notification waiver instead of making a full notification.  The fee is $8,300 and the ACCC has up to 25 business days to decide.

In practice, the waiver has become the workhorse of the regime: between 1 January and 30 June 2026, the ACCC determined 244 waiver applications and granted 230 of them, against 143 formal notifications, with an average turnaround of about 13 business days.

For clean deals the waiver route is materially cheaper and faster than a Phase 1 notification and should be the first option considered.

Thresholds and indicia of concern

The thresholds are jurisdictional, not substantive.  Meeting one obliges the parties to notify; it says nothing about whether the ACCC will approve.  Check the current figures in the Determination before assuming a deal is or is not caught, particularly the asset and voting-power thresholds that commenced on 1 April 2026.

Beyond the thresholds, the ACCC’s guidance identifies concentration levels and market shares as useful screens, not determinative tests.  As a practical matter, transactions producing high combined market shares in a concentrated market, removing a close competitor or reducing the number of significant players attract closer review.

The following indicia should prompt a full competition assessment:

• High combined market share. Especially in a market already dominated by a small number of firms.
• Loss of a close or unique competitor. Removal of a vigorous rival, price disruptor or innovator.
• Barriers to entry. Where new entry is unlikely to constrain the merged firm within a reasonable period.
• Coordinated effects. Where the deal makes tacit coordination between remaining players more likely.
• Countervailing power. Absence of large, sophisticated buyers or suppliers able to discipline the merged firm.

Step by step: the ACCC notification process for merger review in Australia

The following 8 steps map the ACCC notification process from initial screen to post-approval compliance.  Each step should be assigned to a responsible party at the outset so nothing slips.  The durations shown for the party-controlled steps are indicative; the ACCC’s Phase 1 and Phase 2 periods are statutory and run in business days from the effective notification date.

1. Initial internal screen and document preparation
   (Deal team / external counsel, 1–5 business days)

• Run a fast competition screen: identify overlaps, define candidate markets, estimate combined shares, flag vertical relationships and check the transaction against the mandatory notification thresholds, including the three-year look-back for serial acquisitions.
• Assemble the core commercial documents (transaction rationale, corporate structure, financials).
• The output of this step is a decision on whether notification is mandatory and, if it is, whether a notification waiver is the better route.

1. Pre-notification engagement
   (External counsel, 2–4 weeks)

• Pre-notification engagement is the most valuable strategic tool in the ACCC merger review Australia process and the ACCC expects it.
• Lodge a draft notification through the ACCC’s acquisitions portal, outline the transaction and request a pre-notification discussion.
• Use this stage to understand the ACCC’s likely concerns, settle the scope of information required and agree the form of notification. The ACCC expects pre-notification engagement to be capable of completion in about 2 weeks for straightforward matters and recommends starting 4 weeks before lodgement for complex ones.

1. Prepare the notification pack / draft submission
   (External counsel + deal team + economic adviser, 1–3 weeks, longer for complex matters)

• Complete the short form or long form notification, with a clear submission and confidential annexes.
• Engage an economic adviser early where market definition or competitive effects are contested.
• The quality and completeness of this pack determines whether the ACCC can work within the statutory period – and whether the notification survives at all, because a notification later found to be materially incomplete loses its effective notification date and must be made again, with the fee paid again.

1. Lodge the notification with the ACCC and pay the fee
   (External counsel as applicant; the statutory clock starts on the effective notification date)

• Submit the notification package and pay the Phase 1 fee of $56,800 (small business entities are exempt from the fee).
• The effective notification date is the day the notification is made and the fee is paid. That is when the 30 business day Phase 1 period begins.
• There is no separate acceptance-as-complete gate, but the ACCC can later determine that a notification was materially incomplete, which removes the effective notification date and requires the parties to start again.

1. ACCC Phase 1 assessment
   (ACCC, 30 business days)

• The ACCC publishes the notification on the public acquisitions register within one business day, conducts its first-pass competitive analysis and begins targeted market inquiries. It cannot approve before business day 15, and any remedy must be offered by business day 20.
• Most transactions clear at this stage. Of the determinations completed in the first half of 2026, roughly 95% were resolved in Phase 1, in an average of about 20 business days.
• Deal teams should stay responsive to information requests to keep the review on track.

1. Referral to Phase 2 and notice of competition concerns
   (ACCC, up to 90 business days)

• If the ACCC is not in a position to approve the acquisition in Phase 1, it refers the matter to Phase 2. The Phase 2 fee – $475,000, $855,000 or $1,595,000 depending on transaction value – must be paid within 7 business days of referral or the assessment ends.
• The ACCC issues a notice of competition concerns by business day 25 setting out its preliminary competitive assessment.
• The parties respond by business day 50.
• Any remedy must be offered by business day 60.
• A block-out period runs from business day 75 to the end of the period.

1. Market testing and third party submissions
   (ACCC + market participants)

• The ACCC contacts customers, competitors and suppliers to test the parties’ claims. The acquisition is on the public acquisitions register from business day 1, so confidentiality planning has to be done before lodgement, not after; a narrow exception delays publication for up to 17 business days for genuine surprise hostile takeovers.
• Deal teams should anticipate this outreach, prepare consistent messaging and consider confidentiality protections for commercially sensitive material used in testing.

1. Determination, conditions or public benefit assessment
   (ACCC / parties)

• The ACCC either approves the transaction, approves it subject to conditions (such as divestments or behavioural commitments) or refuses to approve it. The ACCC can impose conditions unilaterally, and its stated preference is for structural remedies rather than behavioural ones.
• If the ACCC refuses, or approves on conditions the parties will not accept, the parties may apply within 21 calendar days for a public benefit assessment, in which the ACCC has 50 business days to decide whether the public benefit outweighs the public detriment. Alternatively, an application for limited merits review may be made to the Australian Competition Tribunal within 14 calendar days after the ACCC publishes its reasons; the Tribunal generally decides within 90 days, on the material that was before the ACCC.
• An approval lapses if the acquisition is not put into effect within 12 months, and any conditions then move to a compliance-monitoring phase.

Practical tip: Treat pre-notification as the deal’s most valuable early consultation.  A candid, well-prepared, pre-notification discussion often shortens the formal review, reduces the risk of a materially incomplete notification and lets you calibrate contract timing to a realistic approval date rather than an optimistic one.

Notification strategy: mandatory obligations, waivers and voluntary engagement

Under the new regime, notification is compulsory for acquisitions meeting the prescribed thresholds and those transactions are suspended until cleared.  

For transactions below the thresholds, deal teams still make a deliberate strategic choice about whether to engage the ACCC proactively.

Engaging early gives you control and predictability; staying silent preserves confidentiality but risks a reactive inquiry later where a below-threshold deal nonetheless raises competition concerns and section 50 continues to apply to those deals.

The comparison below frames the trade-off for transactions where notification is not mandatory.

Factor	Proactive notification / engagement	No engagement (wait and deal with inquiries)
ACCC visibility	Early, controlled	Reactive, unpredictable
Time predictability	More predictable timetable if accepted	Risk of surprise probes and extended delays
Information sharing	Structured submission; possible confidentiality	May trigger public process later
Deal certainty	Better for risk allocation in contracts	Higher break fee / indemnity risk
Typical use case	Complex, high-market-share deals	Small, non-overlapping transactions below thresholds

Required documents: what you must prepare for a smooth review

A complete, well-organised notification is the fastest route through ACCC merger review Australia.  The clock starts when the notification is made and the fee is paid, but a notification the ACCC later finds materially incomplete loses its effective notification date – so completeness is not a precondition to the clock starting, it is the condition of the clock continuing to run.  The ACCC needs enough evidence to understand the transaction, define the relevant markets and test the parties’ competition claims.

Prepare the following materials early and keep confidential and non-confidential versions clearly separated.

Document / material	Typical contents / purpose
Cover letter / executive summary	Transaction rationale, parties, structure, value
Public submission	Non-confidential submission summarising competitive effects
Confidential annex (commercially sensitive data)	Pricing, costs, customer lists, contracts, margins
Market definition and data	Product/service definitions, geographic scope, market shares
Financial information	Revenue, EBITDA, transaction structure, valuation support
Customer and supplier evidence	Major contracts, supply agreements, dependence evidence
Organisational charts & overlap maps	For assessing horizontal/vertical overlaps
Economic report / expert analysis	Market definition, competitive effects modelling
Confidentiality undertakings request	If market testing requires confidentiality protection
Closing and implementation timetable	Timing that helps ACCC assess urgency and remedies

Commercial documents

Board papers, the sale and purchase agreement and internal strategy documents describing the rationale for the deal are frequently the most influential materials.  Where internal documents discuss competitors, pricing power or market position, the ACCC will read them closely, so ensure the public narrative is consistent with the contemporaneous record.  The ACCC can compel documents under section 155 and doing so can extend the statutory period, so the record should be assembled and understood before lodgement rather than after a notice arrives.

Market and financial data

Supply robust market-share estimates with clearly stated sources and assumptions, together with revenue, margin and volume data.  Where you assert that entry or expansion by rivals will constrain the merged firm, support the claim with evidence rather than assertion.

Confidential annexes

Segregate commercially sensitive material into confidential annexes and clearly mark it.  This protects your position while allowing the ACCC to conduct meaningful market testing on a redacted basis.  Request confidentiality undertakings where sensitive material must be shared with third parties and remember that the existence of the acquisition is public from business day 1.

Timeline and deadlines: the merger review timeline in Australia

Under Part IVA the timetable is statutory.  Phase 1 runs for 30 business days from the effective notification date; Phase 2, if the matter is referred, runs for a further 90 business days; and a public benefit assessment adds up to 50 business days.  The periods can be extended – where the parties offer a remedy (up to 15 additional business days), where the ACCC issues a section 155 notice, where the parties are late in providing information, or at the parties’ request.

The table below sets out the typical sequence and indicative durations. Treat the totals as a planning baseline, not a guarantee.

Step	Who (lead)	Typical duration / timeline
0. Initial internal screen & document prep	Deal team / external counsel	1–5 business days (fast screen)
1. Pre-notification engagement	External counsel / target / buyer	2–4 weeks (ACCC expects ~2 weeks for simple matters)
2. Prepare notification pack (draft submission)	External counsel + deal team + economic adviser	1–3 weeks (complex matters longer)
3. Notification lodged and fee paid	External counsel (applicant)	Clock starts on the effective notification date (fee $56,800)
4. ACCC Phase 1 assessment	ACCC	30 business days; no approval before business day 15; remedies by business day 20
5. Referral to Phase 2 and notice of competition concerns	ACCC	Up to 90 business days; notice of competition concerns by business day 25; remedies by business day 60
6. Market testing / submissions period	ACCC + market participants	Within Phase 1 or Phase 2 as applicable
7. Determination, commitments or public benefits pathway	ACCC / parties	Public benefit assessment adds up to 50 business days; Tribunal review within 14 calendar days of reasons
8. Post-clearance monitoring or commitments compliance	Parties / ACCC	Ongoing; an approval lapses if the acquisition is not put into effect within 12 months

Standard timelines

For an uncontroversial transaction with a well-prepared notification, deal teams should plan for 2 to 4 weeks of preparation and pre-notification engagement followed by a Phase 1 period of up to 30 business days – in practice, an average of about 20 business days across the first half of 2026, with more than 90% of matters assessed within 20 business days.

Matters escalated to Phase 2 take substantially longer: 90 business days is roughly four and a half months, and a contested matter that proceeds to a public benefit assessment or Tribunal review can run for the better part of a year.

When the ACCC will request more information

The ACCC extends timelines when it needs more information, issues a notice of competition concerns or conducts extensive market testing, and the statutory period may be extended where a section 155 notice is issued or the parties are slow to respond.  Remedy negotiations are a common source of delay because the ACCC must be satisfied that any divestment or behavioural remedy fully resolves the competition concern – and the Phase 1 and Phase 2 remedy deadlines (business day 20 and business day 60) are hard, so a remedy offered late will not be considered.  To avoid drift, respond to information requests promptly and completely and anticipate likely questions in the initial submission.

Costs and fees: direct and indirect costs of ACCC review

Filing fees are now a real budget item. 

• The Phase 1 notification fee is $56,800; a notification waiver application is $8,300.
• The Phase 2 fee is $475,000 for transactions valued at $50 million or less, $855,000 for transactions above $50 million and up to $1 billion, and $1,595,000 above $1 billion.
• A public benefit application is $401,000. 
• Small business entities (aggregated turnover under $10 million) are exempt from the fee. 

Those amounts sit on top of the largest expenses in any merger review – legal and economic advisory fees and the financing or opportunity cost of any delay to completion.  Fees are set by regulation and should be confirmed against current ACCC and Treasury material before budgeting.

Cost item	Typical range / notes
Legal fees (notification + strategy)	Varies widely by complexity
Economic expert report	Varies widely by complexity
Market research / customer surveys	Variable; commissioned where competitive effects are contested
ACCC notification fee	Phase 1 $56,800; waiver $8,300; Phase 2 $475,000–$1,595,000 by deal value; public benefit application $401,000; small business fee exemption
Transaction delay costs / financing	Varies (deal financing cost of weeks/months)
Remedial costs (if commitments required)	Highly variable; may include divestment valuations or behavioural remedies

Typical cost drivers

Costs scale with contested market definition, the volume of internal documents to review, the intensity of market testing and whether remedies are required.  The categories above are indicative and should be validated against current market rates and the specifics of the transaction.

Deal teams should budget for economic evidence early in any matter with a genuine horizontal overlap, under-investing at the submission stage frequently costs more in delay later.

What changes in 2026: policy and practice updates M&A teams must watch

The regime itself is now settled: mandatory notification has applied since 1 January 2026 and the transitional arrangements have run their course.  The live issue for the balance of 2026 is the amending legislation.

The Treasury Laws Amendment (Strengthening Accountability for Tax Adviser Misconduct and Other Measures) Bill 2026, introduced on 2 July 2026, would replace automatic voiding for acquisitions that were never notified with a voidable model requiring a Federal Court declaration on the ACCC’s application, allow parties to seek extensions where an approval has gone stale, and narrow the associate and control concepts used to assess joint acquisitions.  Automatic voiding would remain for acquisitions completed while under review, completed after refusal or completed on a stale approval. 

The Bill passed the House of Representatives on 20 August 2026.  Its passage through the Senate should be confirmed before any advice is given in reliance on it.

Enforcement focus for 2026

The ACCC has signalled continued scrutiny of concentrated consumer-facing markets, acquisitions that remove emerging or maverick competitors and serial or “creeping” acquisitions in sectors where a series of small deals cumulatively reduces competition.  The three-year look-back in the notification thresholds, and the ACCC’s ability to assess an acquisition together with acquisitions put into effect in the preceding three years, are designed to capture exactly that.  The likely practical effect is that transactions previously treated as low-risk on market-share grounds alone may still attract inquiry where they consolidate an already concentrated sector.

Practical effects on pre-notification strategy

Robust, evidence-led pre-notification engagement is more important, not less, under the new regime, because the statutory clock is short and the ACCC will not extend it to accommodate a notification that should have been complete on day one.  For the ACCC merger review Australia process in 2026, deal teams should engage earlier, prepare economic evidence sooner and assume that the ACCC will test competitive effects rigorously through market outreach.  Building a realistic approval timeline into the deal calendar, and into the contract, is the single most effective way to manage that risk.

Common pitfalls and contract implications for buyers and sellers

Clearance risk is ultimately a contracting problem: who bears the delay, who bears the cost of remedies and what happens if the ACCC does not approve the deal.  Getting these provisions right at signing prevents disputes at completion.  The stakes are higher than under the informal regime: completing a notifiable transaction before approval does not merely expose the parties to penalties of up to the greater of $100 million, three times the benefit obtained or 30% of adjusted turnover, it renders the acquisition void.

Drafting for uncertainty

• Conditions precedent. Make ACCC approval under Part IVA a clear condition precedent and define precisely what constitutes acceptable approval, including whether approval subject to conditions counts and whether the 14 calendar day Tribunal review window must have expired before completion.
• Long-stop date. Set a realistic long-stop date.  Phase 1 and Phase 2 together are 120 business days before any extension, and a public benefit assessment or Tribunal review can add several months more; a long-stop date built on a clean Phase 1 will not survive escalation.
• Pre-closing covenants. Require the parties to cooperate on the notification, respond to information requests and refrain from steps that prejudice approval.  Interim covenants must not go so far as to transfer control or coordinate competitive conduct before completion – that is gun-jumping and it carries penalty and cartel exposure of its own.
• Efforts standards. Specify the level of effort the buyer must make to obtain approval, including whether it must offer or accept remedies such as divestments, and whether that obligation is capped by value or by business unit.

• Fee allocation. Say who bears the notification fee and, more importantly, the Phase 2 fee, which can reach $1,595,000 and falls due within 7 business days of referral.

Allocation of ACCC clearance risk

• Reverse break fees. Consider a fee payable by the buyer if the deal fails on competition grounds, to compensate the seller for lost time and opportunity.
• Remedy risk allocation. Address who bears the cost and consequences of any divestment or behavioural commitment the ACCC requires.
• Indemnities and completion risk. Allocate the risk of delay, gun-jumping exposure and the consequences of a void acquisition between buyer and seller and address the practical unwinding problem that voidness creates for third parties.

Sequencing with FIRB and other approvals

Where the buyer is a foreign person, the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act 1975 (Cth) applies in parallel.

In practice, the Treasurer will not ordinarily issue a no objection notification until the ACCC has completed its assessment, so the FIRB and ACCC timetables should be run together and the long-stop date should reflect the longer of the two, not the shorter.

Practical tip: Do not draft the clearance condition in a vacuum.  Match the long-stop date and efforts standard to the realistic timeline for the specific deal: a clean overlap can settle within Phase 1 in about 4 weeks, but a contested horizontal transaction can run through Phase 2 for 4 to 5 months and beyond and the contract must survive both outcomes.

Quick checklist: printable steps for deal teams

1. Screen the deal against the mandatory notification thresholds, including the three-year look-back, and for horizontal, vertical and conglomerate concerns (1–5 business days).
2. Confirm whether notification is compulsory and, if it is, whether a notification waiver is available (25 business days, $8,300).
3. Begin pre-notification engagement through the ACCC’s acquisitions portal (2–4 weeks).
4. Prepare the submission pack with public and confidential versions plus economic evidence (1–3 weeks).
5. Lodge the notification and pay the $56,800 fee; the clock starts on the effective notification date.
6. Manage the 30 business day Phase 1 review, respond to information requests promptly and offer any remedy by business day 20.
7. Handle any referral to Phase 2, the notice of competition concerns and market testing, and offer any remedy by business day 60.
8. Secure approval, complete within 12 months and manage conditions compliance post-completion.

Conclusion

ACCC merger review Australia is best treated as an integrated workstream that runs alongside, not after, the commercial deal, particularly now that a mandatory and suspensory regime applies.  Screen early against the notification thresholds, consider a waiver where the deal is clean, engage the ACCC through pre-notification where the risk is real, prepare a complete and candid notification with economic evidence and build a realistic approval timeline into both your deal calendar and your contract.

The first year of the new regime shows a regulator meeting its statutory deadlines and clearing the great majority of deals quickly, but also one prepared to refuse transactions and to reject behavioural remedies.  The deal teams that plan for the ACCC merger review Australia process from day one will secure faster approvals, cleaner risk allocation and greater completion certainty.  Where the competition analysis is genuinely contested, obtain specialist advice before signing.

Need Legal Advice?

This article was produced by Global Law Experts. For specialist advice on this topic, contact David Walker at 3D Corporate Law, a member of the Global Law Experts network.

Sources

1. Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth), Part IVA and section 50, Federal Register of Legislation
2. Treasury Laws Amendment (Mergers and Acquisitions Reform) Act 2024 (Cth)
3. Competition and Consumer (Notification of Acquisitions) Determination 2025 (Cth), as amended with effect from 1 April 2026
4. ACCC, Merger assessment guidelines (June 2025) and Merger process guidelines (interim version, December 2025)
5. ACCC, Thresholds for notifying acquisitions; Assessment process and review timelines; Notifying an acquisition (accc.gov.au)
6. ACCC, published merger reform data for the period 1 January to 30 June 2026
7. Australian Competition Tribunal, review of ACCC acquisition determinations
8. Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act 1975 (Cth) and Foreign Investment Review Board guidance, for parallel foreign investment approval
9. Treasury Laws Amendment (Strengthening Accountability for Tax Adviser Misconduct and Other Measures) Bill 2026 (Cth)