The 2025 China Fair Competition Policy Publicity Week on 8-12 September is themed “Unified National Market, Fair Competition for the Future,” aiming to strengthen societal awareness of fair competition and promote the development of an efficient, standardized, and unified national market with fair competition. On 8 September, the Supreme People’s Court released eight typical cases against unfair competition, covering important legal issues such as passing off, infringement of technical secrets, commercial defamation, and online unfair competition. These cases span various industries and emerging sectors, including e-commerce, car maintenance services, artificial intelligence, and live streaming platforms.
These cases collectively reflect three key characteristics:
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Adherence to strict protection to maintain the order of fair competition;
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Resolute punishment of unfair competition practices such as “free-riding on established brands” to support high-quality development;
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Proper handling of new types of disputes to guide the standardized development of new business formats.
Brief Summaries of the Eight Cases
- Trade Name Unfair Competition Dispute: Clarifies that registering another’s “influential” trade name, even without actual use, may constitute unfair competition.
- “Centrifugal Compressor Selection” Software and Technical Secret Infringement Case: Severely cracks down on employees secretly establishing competing companies and misappropriating original employers’ technical secrets.
- “Natural Protease 3” Trade Secret Infringement Case: Emphasizes that systematic and complete technical solutions do not lose secrecy merely because partial information is publicly known, demonstrating equal protection of trade secrets for both Chinese and foreign right holders.
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Online Game Third-Party Trading Platform Unfair Competition Case: Determines that a platform providing trading services for illegally obtained game currency constitutes unfair competition.
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“Traffic-Driven Live Streaming Sales” Trademark Infringement and Unfair Competition Case: Applies punitive damages to practices such as free-riding on others’ reputation and creating confusion in live streams.
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“Car Maintenance Service” Commercial Defamation Case: Rules that fabricating and disseminating misleading information constitutes commercial defamation.
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Moving software “Image Theft and Store Copying” Unfair Competition Case: Determines that illegally crawling and transferring platform product data constitutes unfair competition, protecting data rights.
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“Comic Transformation Effect” AI Unfair Competition Case: Clarifies that the structure and parameters of AI models are protected under the Anti-Unfair Competition Law.
In the face of increasingly complex unfair competition practices and a rapidly evolving market environment, how can enterprises effectively protect their rights while ensuring compliant operations?
ICL Consulting can assist you by:
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Conducting comprehensive assessments of infringement risks for core assets such as enterprise trade names, trademarks, and technical secrets;
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Developing trade secret protection systems and employee compliance management mechanisms;
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Addressing new types of unfair competition practices such as platform data crawling, algorithm imitation, and live streaming traffic diversion;
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Providing compliance reviews of competitive strategies and support in case of disputes;
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Offering customized solutions for emerging fields such as artificial intelligence and the digital economy.
ICL Consulting is committed to providing forward-looking and strategic business consulting services to help enterprises achieve steady and sustainable growth in fair competition.
