State Administration for Market Regulation: Focus on preventing and controlling "involution-style" competition in key industries and sectors such as platform economy and photovoltaics

The State Administration for Market Regulation issued on the 30th a notice titled “Notice on Further Implementing and Enforcing the Anti-Unfair Competition Law of the People’s Republic of China.” The notice sets out requirements regarding correctly grasping the key points for implementing and enforcing the Anti-Unfair Competition Law, and actively promoting effective implementation of the Anti-Unfair Competition Law, among other things. The notice emphasizes conducting comprehensive remediation of “involution-style” competition. It focuses on preventing and addressing “involution-style” competition in key industries and areas such as the platform economy, solar photovoltaics, lithium batteries, and new energy vehicles. It calls for accurately identifying, and according to law investigating and punishing, platform enterprises that use measures such as search ranking and business evaluations to force or covertly force operators within the platform to sell goods at prices below cost without any justifiable reason. It stresses strengthening platform operators’ responsibilities and obligations for handling acts of unfair competition, and requires platform operators to clearly define fair-competition rules within the platform. It also seeks to prevent platform operators from improperly interfering with operators’ autonomy in operating their businesses on the platform by mishandling review and management.

The notice also clarifies that it will strengthen supervision and regulation of online unfair-competition conduct. It calls for coordinating the relationship between vitality and order, improving rules for online competition, and focusing on enhancing the level of regular supervision over online unfair-competition conduct. It calls for promptly responding to various new forms of online unfair competition and effectively regulating acts of unfair competition carried out by using data and algorithms, technology, platform rules, and similar means. It further calls for promptly summarizing supervisory and regulatory practice experience, and promoting research and the formulation of the “Regulation on Prohibiting Online Unfair Competition.”

In addition, the notice also specifies key work priorities including preventing and addressing large enterprises and other operators from delaying payment of accounts to small and medium-sized enterprises, strengthening the protection of trade secrets, and exploring extraterritorial enforcement for anti-unfair competition. (Xinhua News Agency)