Gabriela da Costa is a partner in the London office of K&L Gates' Antitrust, Competition, and Trade Regulation practice group and a key member of the firm's cutting-edge e-Commerce and vertical distribution practice.
Gabi advises consumer brands in luxury, fashion, electronics, homewares, beauty, and other sectors on complex competition law questions relating to their go-to-market strategies in the EU and UK, including optimized system design and execution, wholesale pricing, online marketplace policies, direct-to-consumer structuring, customer-competitor dealings, and system enforcement (including litigation). Gabi has defended the distribution models and practices of major brand owners in challenges by both European competition authorities and third parties, leading to the closure of several investigations and lawsuits without fines or damages.
Gabi also advises clients on complex horizontal competitor collaborations, including sustainability agreements. In the mergers and acquisitions context, Gabi has extensive experience coordinating multi-jurisdictional foreign investment screening assessments and clearances, including under the UK's National Security and Investment Act, as well as assisting companies on UK and EU merger control processes.
Gabi is ranked as a Future Leader by Who’s Who Legal and a Next Generation Partner in The Legal 500, where she has been described as a “unique lawyer” working at the “forefront of distribution strategy matters, particularly in the context of sophisticated issues arising in e‐commerce,” and clients say Gabi:
“is simply a rock star. The way she builds trust and relationships is second to none. She is professional, friendly and extremely engaged with any issue.”
“[is] excellent and extremely on-point: highly focused on both the material aspects of matters, but also keeping a keen eye on (cross-border) interests of clients…Gabi has a hawkeye view on aspects of cases that even we hadn’t thought of ourselves.”
“has an encyclopedic knowledge of vertical restraints.”
“super attentive, very knowledgeable and commercial.”
