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Ping Lin, Sep 30, 2015
Three years after its enactment, the Competition Ordinance of Hong Kong is set to come into force on December 14, 2015. This article reviews the conceptually framework which the Hong Kong Competition Commission will be adopting in assessing resale price maintenance, one of the issues at the center of interest in Hong Kong before and after the enactment of the Ordinance.
Emphases will be on the theories of harms, recognized pro-competitive effects of RPM, and the role of intra-brand competition relative to inter-brand competition, as contained in the official guidelines published in July 2015. This article also provides some historical background regarding the occurrence of, and various views about, RPM in Hong Kong in order to fully understand its seemingly “near per se illegal” treatment of RPM.
