China antitrust: Alibaba promises to assist regulators to maintain ‘market order’ after record fine

Alibaba’s pledge was one of 11 released on Friday by tech firms such as video streaming site iQiyi, search engine Sogou and food delivery platform Ele.me

The company said separately that trial programme for merchants on its Tmall platform would begin on April 19

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People walk towards the Alibaba Group Holdings headquarters in Hangzhou, China, on Wednesday, March 24, 2021. Photo: Bloomberg

Published: 12:30pm, 16 Apr 2021Updated: 12:32pm, 16 Apr 2021

Alibaba Group Holding, the internet behemoth hit with a record US$2.8 billion fine from China’s antitrust authorities, has publicly promised to obey antitrust rules and to assist regulators in maintaining “market order”.

Alibaba, the parent company of the South China Morning Post, promised in a public statement that it would not take measures to force merchants to “pick one from two” – the misconduct it was accused of under China’s anti-monopoly law – and would not restrict market competition behaviour using technology means such as data and algorithms.

The company also promised to strengthen food safety and product quality management, improve intellectual property protection, and refrain from “illegal collection or abuse of consumer personal information”.

“We sincerely accept supervision from the competent authorities, the public and the media,” the company said in a statement on Friday.

The Hangzhou-based e-commerce giant also said it would “continuously lower the threshold for small businesses” to sell goods on its platforms.

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