Anti-trust risks in group transaction (I)

I. Exemption of group transaction
Group transactions keep a market vibrant, and lower the Participants’ costs in various aspects. Small and medium-sized companies unite through group transaction and rival against large corporations by aggregating their market shares. Reasonable group transactions are allowed in all major antitrust jurisdictions. Take China as an example: according to the Anti-Monopoly Law (AML), a “safe harbour” provides that horizontal and vertical agreements reached for the purpose of enhancing operational efficiency and reinforcing the competitiveness of small and medium-sized business operators are not prohibited. However, there is substantial uncertainty in applying the “safe harbour” to a specific case, and the businesses are responsible for proving that their transaction should be exempted, and they should additionally prove that the agreement will not substantially restrict competition and can enable the consumers to share the benefits therefrom. More importantly, the concept of ‘small and medium-sized business operators’ is not yet clearly defined under the AML. In the broad sense, small and medium-sized business operators refer to companies that only operate in the domestic market.

Given the above uncertainty, Participants in a group transaction still face substantial anti-trust risks. We will discuss this issue from two perspectives: risks between Participants and their transactional counterparties, and risks among Participants.

II. Between Participants and transactional counterparties
When we look into the relationship between Participants and their transactional counterparties, we usually see the Participants as a whole as they act in concert. In actual anti-trust investigations, should there be an antitrust violation, the sharing of liabilities would depend on how Participants are organised: for simple concerted acts, all Participants are liable. For illegal acts conducted through an alliance (such as industrial association or trade union), the alliance and its members are liable; if the alliance is not a social group duly approved and lawfully registered, its members may assume the liability. For illegal acts conducted through a specialised firm, the situation is more complicated as in addition to the firm itself, whether shareholders are liable depends on the roles of the shareholders and to what extent they have been involved.

1. Participants as seller
It is usually more common for Participants to face anti-trust risks as seller. The most common risk in group sales is resale price maintenance. Small and medium-sized companies are more sensitive to price fluctuation when facing the market alone, yet without the ability to control the price of products; as a result, once they had the opportunity to mass their forces as Participants and jointly sell products, they tend to maintain the resale price of products by leveraging such opportunity. This practice is liable to charges of vertical monopoly.

In addition to price restraint, group sales also involve vertical non-price restraints. Non-price restraints are not listed as vertical monopoly in the AML, but are still likely to be affected by the catch-all clause and thus subject to the judgment of the anti-trust enforcement agencies at their discretion. Will vertical non-price restraints constitute unreasonable trade conditions when Participants possess dominant market position? This question requires case-by-case analysis, and to answer it we have to resolve another question in advance: how to evaluate the market share of Participants? Can we aggregate market shares of multiple Participants? To put it simple, business operator(s) with dominant market position can be either a single company, or several companies. So the market shares of multiple Participants can be aggregated. When determining the market position of Participants we may first try to apply the two assumptions of market dominance provided in the AML and the judicial interpretation of the Supreme Court, and if they do not apply, a comprehensive analysis of various market factors may be required. We will discuss the details of determining market dominance in the next issue.

共同交易中的反垄断风险（上）
本文所称共同交易指共同购买或共同销售，即多家企业联合购买或销售产品的行为。参与共同交易的公司（“参与方”）通过各种形式进行联合：最简单的方式是几个参与方联合起来推选代表与交易相对方进行谈判，这种简单的合作通常是偶然的，只针对特定交易；当参与方逐渐增多，能发起有规律的商业交易后，参与方也会组成商会或者协会，然后通过商会或协会的执行机构并且以其名义进行商业谈判；有时候，参与方希望组成更为紧密的联盟以便长期合作，进而占据市场优势地位，也会共同设立一家专门公司，并将参与方的采购或销售业务全部外包给专门公司进行统一运作—例如上期讨论过的专利联营属于典型的共同销售行为，通常以共同设立合资公司管理专利池并对外授权的形式进行运作；随着互联网经济的发展，出现了为促成共同交易而兴起的网络平台，即“团购”网站。“团购”的出现使参与方从公司逐渐拓展至消费者，并使共同交易成为市场中的常态。如果上述网络平台由交易双方以外的第三方搭建，就产生了双边市场。双边市场是一个复杂的问题，我们暂不讨论。

一、 共同交易的豁免
共同交易使市场更具有活力，而且能够降低参与方在交易、仓储、谈判、法律等多方面的成本。中小企业通过共同交易的方式联合起来，利用更大的市场份额与大企业进行抗衡，进而享受更为优惠的合同条款。合理的共同交易在反垄断法主要司法辖区内均得到许可。以中国为例，反垄断法规定，为提高中小经营者经营效率，增强中小经营者竞争力目的而达成的横向与纵向协议不受禁止。这一“安全港”通常认为其主要针对中小企业之间的共同交易而设立。但应当注意，“安全港”在个案中能否适用存在较大不确定性，而且证明个案因适用“安全港”条款而应当豁免的证明责任由经营者承担，经营者还需要额外证明所达成的协议不会严重限制相关市场的竞争，并且能够使消费者分享由此产生的利益。更为重要的是，上述“安全港”仅适用于“中小经营者”，而这一概念在反垄断法下尚无确切定义。这是因为在不同行业（例如电信市场与餐饮市场）中，参与市场交易的企业规模差距往往较大，难以规定统一适用的标准。通常来说，中小经营者指只在国内市场开展经营活动的企业。

基于上述不确定性，共同交易的参与方仍然面临实质性的反垄断风险。我们从两个角度对此进行讨论：参与方与相对方之间的风险，以及参与方之间的风险。

二、 参与方与相对方之间
我们考察参与方与向对方之间的关系时，通常把参与方视作一个整体予以考虑。这既是因为参与方在交易时对外采取一致行动，也是为了方便讨论。在实际的反垄断调查中，如果存在反垄断违规，法律责任的承担往往视参与方的组织形式而定：对于简单的联合行动，各参与方均承担责任。对于通过联盟（例如行业协会或者商会）实施违法行为的，该联盟及其成员均承担责任；如果联盟本身不是依法经过审批而设立的社会团体，则可由成员承担责任。对通过专门公司实施违法行为的，情况可能更为复杂，除了专门公司本身外，股东是否也要承担责任取决于股东在具体违法行为中的角色和参与程度。

1. 参与方作为卖方
通常来说，参与方作为卖方时面临反垄断合规风险的情形更为普遍。共同销售中最常见的反垄断风险是转售价格限制，即参与方要求购买者承诺其转售产品时定价不得低于参与方所规定的价格。当中小企业单独面对市场时，对价格波动更为敏感，但没有能力控制产品的价格；因此它们一旦集结为参与方共同销售产品时，更倾向于利用这一来之不易的机会维持产品的转售价格。这一做法很可能导致纵向垄断的指控。

除价格限制外，共同销售中也会涉及纵向的非价格限制，例如参与方限制买方的销售区域、销售对象、售后服务等。非价格限制并未出现在反垄断法对纵向垄断的禁止性规定中，但仍然有可能适用兜底条款，由反垄断执法机构依据自由裁量进行判断。当参与方占有市场支配地位时，纵向的非价格限制是否有可能构成不合理的交易条件？这是一个需要进行个案分析的问题，而回答它需要先解决一个作为前提的问题：如何确认参与方的市场份额？多个参与方的市场份额是否可以累计计算？简单来讲，具有市场支配地位的经营者可以是单个经营者，也可以是多个经营者，因此多个参与方的市场份额可以累计计算。而判断参与方的市场地位时可以首先尝试适用反垄断法和最高法院司法解释对市场支配地位的两个推定，如果推定不适用，则需要根据多种市场因素进行综合分析。在下期我们会对市场支配地位的认定进行更详细的说明。