BEIJING – Chinese regulators on Thursday announced an anti-monopoly investigation into e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, stepping up official efforts to tighten control over China’s fast-growing tech industries.
The market regulator said it was investigating Alibaba’s policy of “ choosing one of the two, ” requiring business partners to avoid dealing with competitors. The one-sentence statement did not provide details of possible punishments or a timeline for announcing a result.
Chinese leaders previously said it will be an economic priority in the coming year to step up enforcement of the anti-monopoly position. They seem particularly concerned about tightening control over Alibaba and other dominant internet companies that are expanding into the financial, healthcare and other businesses.
Alibaba founder Jack Ma is China’s richest entrepreneur and one of the country’s best-known figures.
Regulators previously forced the suspension of Ant Group’s stock market debut, an online financing platform spun off from Alibaba.
A separate announcement Thursday said Ant officials had been called to meet with regulators.
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BABA,
the world’s largest ecommerce company based on total sales volume, and another company was fined in mid-December for not seeking official approval before making some acquisitions.
In November, the government issued a proposal to prevent anti-competitive behavior by internet companies, such as signing exclusive contracts and using subsidies to squeeze out competitors.