On The Ex-Ante Regulation Of Monopoly Of Digital Platforms

In response to the new monopolistic behavior of digital platforms,anti-monopoly law enforcement agencies in various countries have embarked on the road of prior regulation of digital platforms.Under the guidance of the national "strengthening anti-monopoly" requirements,the Anti-Monopoly Commission of the State Council of China officially issued the Anti-monopoly Guidelines on the Platform Economy,which comprehensively responded to many hot issues in the field of platform economy.At the same time,the latest revision of Anti-Monopoly Law of China has also been completed,and the focus of its revision reflects China’s concern for the platform economy.China’s digital platform monopoly prior regulation mainly has four problems: insufficient prior regulation of platform monopoly advantages,imperfect preventive rules for platform abuse of power,incomplete declaration standards for concentration of undertakings,and failure to manage platforms hierarchically and categorically.The platform obtains market monopoly advantage based on data,which is mainly reflected in three aspects:data collection,refusal of data access,and data integration after mergers and acquisitions.To improve the rules for the prior regulation of the monopoly advantage of the platform market,first,it is necessary to strengthen the control of platform users over personal information and ensure the portability of user data.The second is to formulate scientific and reasonable data interoperability standards to deal with the problem of platforms denying data access.At the same time,data integration can be regulated using structural restriction policies.For the abuse of power by digital platforms,a preventive provision for abuse of power by platforms can be added.The first is to pay attention to the protection of individual users’ rights and interests,the second is to strengthen the supervision of digital platform pricing algorithms to cope with the problem of differentiated pricing of platforms,and the third is to draw on Japan’s "Digital Platform Transaction Transparency" Act to implement daily platform behavior review.At present,the turnover index of China’s concentration declaration is no longer in line with the development status of digital platforms,and it is easy to have a situation where the turnover does not meet the declaration standards,but the merged enterprise occupies a high market share.Moreover,the regulation of large enterprises acquiring small start-ups is too lax,and it is prone to "strangle" mergers and acquisitions.For the resolution of such issues,the Anti-Monopoly Guidelines have included the VIE structure in the scope of merger review,but have not refined and improved the nature and characteristics of the VIE structure.Secondly,when reviewing the concentration of business operators on digital platforms,factors other than turnover can be introduced,such as the number of active users,transaction volume and transaction amount.Finally,M&A restrictions on small businesses by large digital platforms should be tightened to protect emerging or start-ups.For many digital platforms in China,China has not yet carried out hierarchical and categorical supervision of these platforms,and the law has not made clear provisions on their responsibilities,obligations,and behavioral norms,so there is no guidance and direction for platforms to carry out business activities.In particular,super platforms should be included in key supervision,and can learn from the "gatekeeper" system of EU to classify digital platforms by level and set special obligations and responsibilities for them,but at the same time,it is necessary to pay attention to the reasonableness of setting responsibility limits to avoid stifling the enthusiasm and innovation of platforms.