John Messent is a Partner at Cleary Gottlieb in London, where he advises on UK and EU competition law, national security and public-interest regimes, and global foreign investment control. He regularly represents clients in high-stakes multinational transactions and behavioural matters before the UK Competition and Markets Authority, the European Commission, the UK Investment Security Unit, the UK sector regulators, and both UK and EU courts.

John’s transactional experience includes advising on some of the most significant global deals in recent years, including Synopsys’ $35 billion acquisition of Ansys, Broadcom’s $69 billion acquisition of VMware, and Veolia’s €12.9 billion acquisition of Suez.

John is a recognised thought leader in competition law and foreign investment control. Recent publications include the UK chapter of The Dominance and Monopolies Review, the Dominance chapter of UK Competition Regime: A Practitioner’s Guide, and a range of articles on the UK National Security and Investment Act. He also serves as editor of Cleary’s Global FDI Newsletter and has written extensively on UK and EU competition law, UK national security policy, and developments in global FDI and outbound investment screening.

He was seconded for six months to the Policy department of the UK competition authority, working on mergers, Competition Act investigations, and criminal cartel prosecution guidance. During this time, he contributed to the development of core policy documents that continue to guide the authority’s enforcement and merger-control frameworks.