China called on its technology giants to share key data, dealing a further blow to the companies already reeling from heightened antitrust scrutiny, reported Bloomberg.
Companies are encouraged to open up data related to areas from search to e-commerce and social media, in order to promote the healthy development of the sharing and online economies, according to a government report outlining the Communist Party’s top priorities for the next five years. Beijing is also establishing a platform for sharing public and government data.
While Xi Jinping’s government has long identified data as a key resource, it’s the first time that the opening up of data amassed by private-sector companies has been included in the country’s top economic guidelines. Beijing in November launched a sweeping crackdown on alleged monopolistic practices in its giant internet industry, worried about the growing influence of its largest private corporations thanks to the vast swathes of information they’ve hoovered up.
Industry behemoths Alibaba Group Holding and Tencent Holdings as well as up-and-coming competitors like ByteDance and Meituan have at their disposal vast amounts of proprietary information, gathered from the hundreds of millions of consumers shopping on their platforms and using social-media apps like WeChat and Douyin. Surrendering that data could undermine their market-leading positions and deal a heavy blow to their ability to squeeze out smaller competitors.
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