THE country’s market regulator yesterday fined a number of companies, including tech giant Tencent, e-commerce giant Alibaba and video sharing platform Bilibili, for violating the anti-monopoly law. The State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) unveiled 13 cases of violation and slapped a fine of 500,000 yuan (US$78,450) per case. Tencent was involved in nine of the cases and fined for irregularities pertaining to share acquisition in companies including video and photo editing app VERSA Inc., supply chain and logistics service provider Yonghui Yunchuang Technology and application software developer IngageApp Global Ltd., according to an statement on the SAMR website. The move is part of China’s efforts to step up anti-monopoly supervision, especially on internet platforms abusing their dominant market positions. In November 2021, the SAMR listed 43 investment deals that companies failed to report and imposed a 500,000 yuan fine on each one of the companies. (CGTN) |