In May 2013, the National Development and Reform Commission
("NDRC") initiated the investigation
against several infant formula companies for the alleged violation
of Article 14 of the Antimonopoly Law
("AML").
This is the second investigation by NDRC against resale price
maintenance ("RPM"). Early this year,
NDRC fined China's famous producers of premium liquor, Kweichow
Moutai Co Ltd. (Maotai) and Wuliangye Group Co., Ltd.
(Wuliangye) in the amount of RMB 247 million
(about USD 39.8 million) for RPM behaviors
(Maotai/Wuliangye Case)i . The current
investigation is still ongoing and no penalty against any companies
has been made.
In both RPM investigations of this year, more than one company
was investigated and the investigated companies are competitors
with each other. This is an interesting phenomenon because, unlike
horizontal monopoly agreements, vertical monopoly agreements do not
usually involve collusion among competitors. The media reported
that it was
