BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s market regulator said on Friday it had fined 12 companies in connection with ten transactions that violated monopoly rules.
The companies include Baidu Inc, Tencent Holdings, Didi Chuxing, SoftBank and a firm backed by ByteDance, the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) said in a statement on Friday.
The SAMR said the companies were each fined 500,000 yuan ($ 77,000) for behavior that caused market concentration.
Tencent said in a statement that it would actively rectify the operations and provide the regulator with timely reports on transactions.
ByteDance said a joint venture between its affiliate firm and Shanghai Dongfang Newspaper Co. Ltd, both of which were fined, was never operational and the JV was dissolved in January.
SoftBank declined to comment. Baidu and Didi did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
China has intensified its investigation into its internet giants in recent months, citing concerns about monopolistic behavior and possible violations of consumer rights.
The regulator fined Alibaba, Tencent-backed China Literature and other businesses for failing to properly report antitrust ratings. The company also imposed a fine that was involved in a car-related transaction on Thursday.
Reporting by Yingzhi Yang, Cheng Leng, Pei Li, Yilei Sun and Tony Munroe; Edited by Christian Schmollinger, Karishma Singh and Lincoln Feast