A man holding a phone walks past a sign by Chinese company ByteDance’s app TikTok, locally known as Douyin, at the International Artificial Products Expo in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, China on October 18, 2019.
Reuters
Regulators fined Alibaba a record $ 2.8 billion over the weekend over stiff competition in online retail, and met with affiliate Ant on Monday and ordered it to restructure as a financial holding company.
Then the State Administration for Market Regulation on Tuesday warned 34 Chinese “internet platforms” in a meeting to learn from the violent actions against Alibaba and to submit a plan within a month to comply with the monopolistic practices.
Chinese regulators have been focusing their attention on Jack Ma’s e-commerce giant and its fintech subsidiary Ant Group for the past few months, whose giant wallet was abruptly suspended in November. Authorities began investigating Alibaba in December, primarily for use in forcing traders to choose one of two platforms, rather than having them work with both.
The details of the 12 corporate pledges issued Wednesday spoke out across the business world, and efforts to support fair competition and consumer data protection were generally discussed. Listed companies include Baidu, JD.com, Meituan, the antivirus software industry Qihoo 360, the Twitter-like social media platform Sina Weibo, TikTok parent ByteDance, the group-buying e-commerce website Pinduoduo, the electronic retailer Suning and the e-mail trading company Vipshop.
The announcement is the first in a series of such promises that will take place over the next three days, the regulator said.
Other names traded in the U.S. or Hong Kong are mentioned in Tuesday’s list of 34 Internet platforms not included in Wednesday’s initial round, including iQiyi, Bilibili, Kuaishou, Mogu and 58.com.
CNN’s Arjun Kharpal contributed to this report.