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On May 27, State Administration of Industry and Commerce (“SAIC”) published new draft regulations on monopoly agreements, abuse of dominant position and administrative monopoly for public comments. These sets of unveiled draft rules are resulted from pubic opinions and comments which SAIC has collected since June 2010, this is when SAIC first published the draft regulations. Within China’s antitrust law enforcement system, SAIC has the mandate to condemn non-price-related monopoly agreements, non-price-related abuse of dominant position and administrative monopoly. Furthermore, it has mandate to fashion implementing rules for the Anti-Monopoly Law of PRC (“AML”) too.

 Continue Reading SAIC Published New Draft Rules on Cartels, Abuse of Dominant Position and Administrative Monopoly

On June 05, 2009, the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC), one of the three enforcement agencies for China’s Anti-Monopoly Law (AML), released two sets of provisions on the procedures to be followed by the agency and its delegates when enforcing the AML. They are: Procedural Provisions on Stopping the Use of Administrative Power to Exclude or Restrict Competition and Procedural Provisions for Investigating Monopoly Agreement and Abuse of Dominant Position Matters. These two provisions will come into effect on July 01, 2009. On June 08, 2009, SAIC published a Set of Questions and Answers about the Two Procedural Provisions on its website, which provides answers and explanations to some of the more pressing issues.Continue Reading Comments on the Recent Procedural Provisions Promulgated by SAIC

Last week, SAIC promulgated two draft regulations relating to China’s Anti-monopoly Law. The new regulations concern abuse of dominance and monopoly agreements.

A prohibition on anti-competitive monopoly agreements and a prohibition against the abuse of market dominance are two of AML’s main prongs; the third being a review of concentration. However, under the AML, the provisions of these two categories lack detail as they are only covered through the broad principles of China’s competition law. Hence, the new draft regulations are welcomed as a mode to increase the detail of and to further develop China’s competition law. Furthermore, substantial private litigation has emerged challenging the abuse of dominance and monopoly agreements. Therefore, SAIC’s promulgation of the two drafts is a welcomed response to this rising trend.
 Continue Reading New Draft SAIC Regulations: Positive Affects for the AML

The first issue faced by SAIC (State Administration for Industry and Trade) is retaining an appropriate degree of manpower. According to the permission from State Council, SAIC has established a specific bureau to cope with monopoly behavior, though its manpower is far from adequate to deal with nationwide AML cases. Based on the provisions of the AML, SAIC may empower its subsidiaries at the provincial level in order to help resolve specific cases. This means SAIC can take advantage of nationwide resources under the present system. However, the question of how to prevent localism and how to guarantee strict compliance with the AML presents a challenging answer.

Continue Reading China’s SAIC Faces New AML Hurdles

When referring to the anti-monopoly authority in China, many first mention the Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China (MOFCOM). However, based on the provisions of the Anti-monopoly Law of the PRC (AML) and the power allocated by the State Council, the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC) will play a primary role in AML enforcement.

Continue Reading China’s SAIC and the Enforcement of the AML