By Liu Ting and Zhang Yuanhao King & Wood Mallesons‘ Commercial & Regulatory group

After 24 years, the Law of the People’s Republic of China against Unfair Competition (hereinafter referred to as “Anti-Unfair Competition Law”) was finally ushered into a new chapter. On November 4, 2017, the new Anti-Unfair Competition Law was passed by the NPC Standing Committee and released on the same day. It will be effective on January 1, 2018. Among all the highlights in the latest law, the new regulation on operators’ commercial bribery is one of the most eye-catching changes. Apart from paragraph 1 of Article 7, which limits the scope of bribery, paragraph 3 of Article 7 also includes the condition that an operator is defined as not constituting commercial bribery, that is, “The bribery committed by an employee of a business operator shall be deemed as conducted by the business operator, unless otherwise evidence given by the operator shows that such bribery is not related to seeking a business opportunity or gaining competitive advantage for the business operator.” This provides one possibility for operators to reasonably be exempted from the administrative or even criminal legal liability for commercial bribery. Continue Reading Anti-bribery Management System: Exploring the Legal Application of Operator’s Exemption from Commercial Bribery Liability