2024 Annual Review and 2025 Outlook for TMT Regulation in China
Feb 27, 2025
Regulation of the technology, media and telecoms (“TMT”) sectors in China during 2024 largely maintained the priorities and momentum of recent years (including digital economy, AI, and other emerging technologies), as well as progressing updates to general-purpose laws, such as the Anti-Unfair Competition Law (“AUCL”) (反不正当竞争法), to keep pace with the online ecosystem. There has also been a steady stream of lower-level implementing rules and standards, intended to create consistency for both regulators and companies.
Further, while there were ostensible liberalizations in some sub-sectors to spur economic growth and foreign investment (e.g., value-added telecom services and digital trade), in practice key restrictions remain in place, meaning 2024 did not bring material changes to market access trends. Overall, expectations for both companies and market are similar to those in past years, with the caveat that global political tensions are continuing to create fertile ground for surprise legislation in sensitive sectors.