Among his recent advisory work, Harman continues to represent state-owned oil marketing companies on an important litigation regarding regulatory overlaps between the CCI and the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board. Harman also advises and delivers trainings to companies on compliance issues. He has been instrumental in designing the compliance programme for ACC Limited and conducts regular trainings for the organization, along with conducting regular trainings for Asian Paints.

On the merger control side, Harman has played an instrumental role in obtaining CCI approval for the merger of Publicis Groupe and Omnicom Group. He has advised and secured unconditional clearances for Nippon Steel Corporation’s merger with Sumitomo Metal Industries, Nestlé’s acquisition of Pfizer’s nutrition business, Mitsui’s acquisition of stake in a pharmaceuticals company in India (the first merger control clearance in the pharmaceuticals sector in India), GSK/Novartis in relation to their multi-step transaction involving vaccines, oncology and OTC businesses. He has obtained conditional clearance for the Holcim/Lafarge transaction. Harman represented Allergan in relation to its combination with Pfizer, Halliburton in relation to its acquisition of Baker Hughes, United Technologies Corporation in its acquisition of the eco-energy business of Wipro, TDK and Toshiba in the creation of a joint venture envisaging transfer of customer contracts, Baker Hughes in its merger with General Electric, and DuPont in its merger with The Dow Chemical Company. Harman has also advised on Agrium’s merger with Potash Corporation, the merger between Praxair and Linde and the transaction between Alstom and Siemens in relation to their mobility businesses. Harman secured unconditional clearance for Saudi Aramco in relation to its acquisition of SABIC. Harman has secured unconditional clearance for Alstom’s acquisition of Bombardier Transportation, unconditional clearance for Fiat’s merger with Peugeot and conditional clearance involving the first-of-its-kind quasi-structural remedy in the merger between Metso Minerals and Outotec.

In 2021, Harman obtained unconditional clearances for several high-profile and complex cross-border and domestic transactions, including Siemens Healthineers’ acquisition of Varian Medical Systems, Paradeep Phosphates’ acquisition of Zuari Agro Chemicals, Baring Private Equity Asia’s separate and consecutive investments in Hinduja Global Solutions and Global Content Alpha Partners, the merger of Tech Data Corporation with Synnex and FedEx’s investment in Delhivery. Harman was also pivotal in OMERS Infrastructure Asia obtaining green channel approval for its investment in Azure Power Global. He also obtained clearance on behalf of 9 public financial institutions led by NTPC for the acquisition of Jhabua Power. More recently, Harman was also instrumental in obtaining clearance for EQT’s acquisition of Baring Private Equity Asia and securing unconditional approval for acquisition of stake by SALIC International Investment Company in Olam Agri Holdings Pte. Ltd.

Harman has been acknowledged as a leading lawyer in Global Competition Review’s Who’s Who Legal of Competition Lawyers since 2011. Harman was described as “fabulous, highly intelligent and someone who provides great inputs on all his matters – I have great respect for him” by Chambers Global Guide 2013. Chambers and Partners 2016 stated, “Harman Sandhu is a rising star in the competition practice, who is widely recognized by peers”. One interviewee characterizes him as “a great guy – very intelligent and very hard-working“. In 2018, Chambers and Partners recognized Harman as a notable practitioner, noted that he has a solid reputation and experience in cartelisation and abuse of dominance matters. Interviewees state that he “stands out as one of the most dynamic lawyers,” who is “pragmatic, very effective” and “solution-oriented“. For 2019, Chambers and Partners noted that market sources are “very impressed with his capabilities” and he “comes up with the best advice” for industry-specific and multi-jurisdictional issues, and “stands out for his assured handling of the competition aspects of large, cross-border transactions”. In 2021, Chambers and Partners recognized Harman as “an exceptionally smart lawyer and great strategist“ and he has been ranked as a ‘Global Leader‘ and ‘Global Elite Thought Leader’ in the Who’s Who Legal Rankings for Competition Law in 2021. In 2022, Harman was ranked as ‘Global Elite Thought Leader’ and ‘Thought Leader for India’ for Competition Law, by Who’s Who Legal. In 2022, Chambers and Partners noted that a source appreciates that “he owns the brief and handholds the client through the entire process,” and another interviewee considers “his legal advice to be an excellent bridge between stakeholder demands and the regulators”.

Harman has co-authored leading guides on the law of Dominance and Merger Control in India in the Getting the Deal Through series, which are key global reference materials for these areas of law.

Before joining the firm, Harman worked with the Office of Communications (UK) and the Directorate General of Competition in the European Commission – Cartels Division (Belgium), focusing on competition law issues. Harman holds an LL.B. from M. D. University and completed his LL.M. in Competition Law from King’s College London under the supervision of Professor Richard Whish, a world-renowned competition law expert.

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