Margrethe Vestager: The Woman Shaping The Future Of EU Competition Policy And The Economy

The European Union's Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager has gained a reputation as one of Europe's most consequential politicians – Foreign Policy said she might even redefine the 21st century economy. 

Indeed, she has lead investigations on Apple, Amazon, Google, Gazprom, McDonald’s, several telecoms companies and Starbucks. And while she inherited a few of them from her predecessor, "she has accelerated them to their finish lines", as Bloomberg Businessweek's Samanth Subramanian says in her profile of the woman behind the headlines. The piece is a must-read, as it delves into Vestager's upbringing and background, uncovers a bit on her beliefs and convictions, and examines how these have had an effect on her career in the public sector.

The former Danish economic minister indeed built a reputation for efficiency and keeping a tight rein on austerity measures at home. But her steely enforcement of Europe's rules on competition took her to a whole new arena. Her success is partly due to her political savviness and her skepticism of common arguments in the corporate world – she has little patience for exaggerated efficiency claims, for example, and is famous for having listened to one of Tim Cook's lectures on corporate tax, irritated but also unabated.

So this aplomb, and her ability to stick to the rule book, has gained her both friends and enemies. And with two and a half more years before the end of her term, the commissioner's workload may only become more relevant in the policy arena: with a bunch of big mergers to rule on, some vital antitrust cases to finish, and upcoming court decisions on her previous rulings, her legacy is definitely at stake.