The penalty is Beijing’s toughest action to date in its campaign to tighten supervision of the country’s internet Goliaths.
Beijing’s market watchdog began investigating Alibaba in December for potential antitrust violations including preventing merchants from selling their goods on other shopping platforms. On Saturday, the regulator said its investigation had concluded that Alibaba had hindered competition in online retail in China, affected innovation in the internet economy and harmed consumers’ interests.
Alibaba said in a statement that it would accept the penalty “sincerely” and would strengthen its internal systems “to better carry out its social responsibilities.”
Skepticism about the clout of large internet companies has been on the rise in the United States and Europe, too. Western regulators have repeatedly fined Goliaths such as Google in recent years for various antitrust violations. But such penalties generally have not changed the nature of the companies’ businesses enough to mitigate concerns about their power.
Source: New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/technology/china-alibaba-monopoly-fine.html
Wallstreet Journal: https://www.wsj.com/articles/alibaba-hit-with-record-2-8-billion-antitrust-fine-by-chinas-market-regulator-11618018830
Submitted April 09, 2021 at 10:10PM by ShubhamG77 https://ift.tt/2QdCiUU
