Category Archives: Competition law

Legal Analysis on Conflict Between Domain and Name Right According to Chinese Law, I

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By Albert Chen

In recent, one of the hot news in China, might be Mr. Zhou Libo’s taking back the network domain in his name (Zhou is the comedian star of Shanghai style small talk, a talk-show like performance in Shanghai dialect). Ms. Yue from Beijing registered “zhoulibo.com” (the “domain”) in 2007, and in September of 2011, Mr. Zhou filed the arbitration in the Asian Domain Name Dispute Resolution Centre (ADNDRC), claiming that the main part of the domain is as same as the pinyin of his name which is highly possible to result in the misunderstanding among the public. The ADNDRC finally adjudicated the domain to Mr. Zhou. For the dissatisfaction with the decision, Ms. Zhou brought the dispute to Shanghai No.2 Intermediate People’s Court, but the court refused all the claims of her.

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Can Court Challenge Leviathan with New Anti-monopoly Judicial Interpretation?

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By Frank Yu

China anti-monopoly law, judicial jurisdiction, burden of proof, liability scope, anti-monopoly judicial interpretation, administrative monopoly, the industries which exercise monopoly over the production and sale of certain commodities, price supervision, public company, operator with monopolic position, abuse dominant position in the market, market structure, competition condition, market dominant position determination, regulation on monopolic conduct, sell with price lower than cost, refuse to transact, different treatment of price, fairness, justice, independence of courts, large scale state-owned enterprise, fair competition, economy operation efficiency, consumer interests, social public interests, administrative level, anti-monopoly lawsuit social effect, state secret, business secret, personal privacy, opened hearing, showed to the agent, confidentiality commitment, expert witness, cross inquiry

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The Highlight of the Anti-Monopoly Judicial Interpretation

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By You Yunting

On 8th May of 2012, the Supreme People’s Court (the “SPC”) issued the Regulations on Several Issues concerning the Law Application in the Hearing of Civil Disputes Arising from the Monopolistic Conduct (the “Judicial Interpretations”). By the Judicial Interpretations, the people’s court shall accept the lawsuit filed by the citizens for the monopolistic conduct; for the joint-price-increasing and other monopolistic conducts, the alleged company shall take the burden of proof. According to the statement of the SPC, the anti-monopoly lawsuit shall be no longer pre-conditioned by the administrative determination. The regulation will come into effect from 1st of June. This is another major event after the enforcement of Anti-monopoly Law from 1st August 2008, today, we will make introduce you the highlight of the new regulation.

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Full Text of Judicial Interpretation on Anti-Monopoly Law of China Supreme Court

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The Supreme People’s Court issued Regulation on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Cases arising from Monopolistic Conducts yesterday and the new judicial interpretation of Anti-Monopoly Law will take effect on 1st June, 2012. We have translated the Chinese version into English as follows:

Regulation on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Cases arising from Monopolistic Conducts

To ensure the proper judgment of civil disputes arising from the monopoly, prevent monopolistic conducts, protecting and promoting fair competition in the market, safeguarding the interests of consumers and social public interests, this regulation is enacted according to the relevant regulations such as the Anti-monopoly Law of the People’s Republic of China, the General Principle of the Civil Law of the People’s Republic of China, the Law of the People’s Republic of China on Tort Liability, the Contract Law of the People’s Republic of China and the Civil Procedural Law of the Peoples Republic of China.

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Anti-Trust Law: Please Leave A Window to the Private Enterprise

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Abstract: The merger between Youku and Tudou has drawn wide attention of the medias. Someone event quoted the relevant administrative regulation to demand the initiation of the anti-trust investigation. Well, I hold the different opinion against it. It’s actually infeasible to take a monopoly status in China of private company in China, and to my opinion, the merger and acquisition by private sector shall be permitted by law and exempted from the investigation of anti-trust, which is complying with the purpose of legislature as well as the value orientation of the current phrase.

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360 vs Tencent: The Summary of Anti-Monopoly Court Hearing

On 18th April, 2012, Guangdong Higher People’s Court heard the case of monopolized status dispute filed by Qihoo 360 (NYSE: QIHU) against Tencent (HKEX: 700), with the claim of 150 million yuan. For the background information of the case, please refer to Wiki and a letter from Zhou Hongyi, the CEO of Qihoo 360 to his employees.

The information disclosed from the indictment of Qihoo 360:

I. The request of Qihoo 360

Demanding Tencent to cease the infringement of abusing its market monopoly status, including but not limited to cease the limitation on the transaction between QQ user and Qihoo 360, selling the safeguard software in QQ; demanding the joint compensation by the defendants to the losses of RMB 150 million yuan and the apology to Qihoo 360, also the expenses of reasonable costs and lawsuit fee paid by Qihoo 360 shall also be borne by Tencent.

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Opinions on E-Commerce’s Unauthorized Change to Consumers’ Comments

Case: A noted Chinese E-commerce website is recently charged with unauthorized modification to customer’s comments on the product sold.(note: the link is in Chinese) A newly bought mobile phone was found used by a consumer from Hangzhou City, who afterwards gave a poor comment on the product. Surprisingly to him, his comment was then changed to satisfy one a month later, for this the consumer only got the reply from the website that it’s a misoperation. Actually, it’s not an individual case in recent. (the image is the logo of 360buy.com, a main B2C website in China)

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Does Combination of Youku and Tudou breach China Anti-monopoly law?

Reportedly(the report is in Chinese), the two Chinese leading video websites, Youku.com Inc. (NYESE: YOUKU) (“Youku”) and Tudou Holdings Ltd. (NASDAQ: TUDOU) (“Tudou”) jointly announced today that on 11th March, 2012, they have signed a definitive agreement for the combination of Tudou and Youku in a 100% stock for stock transaction, which has been approved by each party’s board of director but still waiting for the shareholders’ approval, and is planned to be completed in the third quarter of 2012.I think, it shall be noted that some anti-monopoly issues may be arisen from the combination of the two Chinese biggest video websites, which possibly resulting adverse impacts on the rights and interests of consumers and fair competition.

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A Compromise between Michael Jordan and Qiaodan Sports?

Reportedly (Note this report is in Chinese), Michael Jordan, the star sportsman of NBA, recently made a statement that Qiaodan Sports Co., Ltd. (“Qiaodan Sports”) is suspected of infringement on his right of name, and he had initiated the legal proceeding in the People’s Court of China. And by the late news, the Shanghai Second Intermediate People’s Court has accepted this case. It is reported (Note this report is in Chinese) that the Qiaodan Sports has been approved by the Issuance Examination Committee of Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE) to issue 11.25 million shares collecting RMB 1.06 billion, which would be issued publicly upon the future approval of China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC). (the image above is the trademark information retrieved from the trademark office of PRC)

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