Antitrust Alert: China's SAIC Publishes its Final Anti-Monopoly Law Rules

Two days after China's National Development and Reform Commission ("NDRC") published its final rules implementing China's Anti-Monopoly Law ("AML"), China's other non-merger antitrust agency, the State Administration of Industry and Commerce ("SAIC"), published three sets of implementing rules pertaining to abuses of dominant position, anticompetitive agreements ("monopoly agreements"), and administrative monopolies. These rules constitute the primary substantive and procedural rules governing the enforcement of the AML against anticompetitive conduct.

Except for detailed guidelines on the application of the AML to intellectual property rights, China's non-merger antitrust agencies now have released all their anticipated rules and guidelines, procedural and substantive, placing them in position to start to enforce the AML against anticompetitive conduct much more vigorously.