What Trip.com case reveals about China's platform-exclusivity fight
By MLex Staff ( July 29, 2026, 08:06 GMT | Comment) -- China's antitrust decision against Trip.com reinforces rather than reshapes China's approach to abusive exclusive dealing. While platforms have shifted from explicit contractual restrictions to more concealed methods of enforcing exclusivity, the State Administration for Market Regulation has responded by applying established legal principles with increasingly sophisticated digital evidence and investigative techniques.China's 2021 platform-rectification campaign was meant to end "choose one from two" practices, the exclusivity arrangements that force merchants to pick a single platform. Five years later, Trip.com has become the latest platform sanctioned for abusive exclusive dealing....
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