An Overview of the Intersection of Intellectual Property and Antitrust

I. Fundamental Principles
Intellectual property ("IP") law and antitrust law share a common objective: antitrust law safeguards the competitive mechanism of the market to ensure that the fruits of innovation reach consumers, while IP law grants exclusive rights to incentivize market participants to invest in innovation. Different paths, same destination—both ultimately serve the enhancement of overall social welfare. In the means they employ, however, the two are inherently in tension: the exclusivity of IP rights naturally produces competition-restricting effects, while antitrust law is precisely designed to regulate conduct that restricts competition.
The core principle for addressing this intersection lies in distinguishing between the "lawful exercise of intellectual property rights" and the "abuse of intellectual property rights to eliminate or restrict competition." Article 68 of China's Anti-Monopoly Law expressly provides that the Law does not apply to an undertaking's exercise of its intellectual property rights in accordance with the laws and administrative regulations on intellectual property; however, it does apply to an undertaking's abuse of intellectual property rights to eliminate or restrict competition. This "safe harbor plus exception" legislative model establishes the antitrust analytical framework for the intellectual property field.
II. The Current State of Legislation
China's rule system on intellectual property antitrust now displays a three-tier architecture of "statute—administrative regulations—departmental rules."
At the statutory level, Article 68 of the Anti-Monopoly Law as amended in 2022 carries forward the fundamental position held since the 2008 legislation, and strengthens "encouragement of innovation" as a legislative purpose in the General Provisions, thereby providing a value compass for intellectual property antitrust. In 2020, the Anti-Monopoly Commission of the State Council issued the Anti-Monopoly Guidelines on Intellectual Property Rights, which systematically set out the analytical frameworks for three categories of conduct involving intellectual property—monopoly agreements, abuse of a dominant market position, and concentrations of undertakings—and provided guidance on complex issues such as the safe harbor rules, patent pools, and standard essential patents ("SEPs").
At the level of departmental rules, in 2023 the State Administration for Market Regulation ("SAMR") promulgated the Provisions on Prohibiting the Abuse of Intellectual Property Rights to Eliminate or Restrict Competition, which further refined the identification standards and clarified the types of intellectual property-related monopoly agreements, the factors to be considered in determining a dominant market position, and the specific manifestations of abusive conduct. Sector-specific regulation has simultaneously moved forward apace. In 2025, the Anti-Monopoly and Anti-Unfair Competition Committee of the State Council issued the Anti-Monopoly Guidelines for the Pharmaceutical Field, laying down dedicated provisions on intellectual property–antitrust crossover issues such as reverse payment patent settlement agreements and product hopping in the pharmaceutical sector, and thereby expanding the outer boundary of conduct that may constitute monopolization through the exercise of pharmaceutical patent rights.
III. Representative Cases
At the judicial level, the Supreme People's Court ("SPC") has continued to generate adjudicative rules through its case-release mechanism for representative cases. Since 2021, the SPC has included intellectual property-related cases in its annual release of representative antitrust cases, covering standard essential patents, collective administration of copyrights, and patent infringement settlement agreements, gradually building an adjudicative rule system for intellectual property antitrust with Chinese characteristics. According to researchers' statistics, from the entry into force of the Anti-Monopoly Law in 2008 through September 2025, China has seen four administrative enforcement cases and 22 civil litigation cases involving the abuse of intellectual property rights to eliminate or restrict competition; the number of such cases is trending upward, and the level of granularity in the applicable rules continues to rise.
China's intellectual property antitrust practice has produced a number of landmark decisions. This article presents one case for each type of conduct.
(1) SEP Monopolization — Huawei Technologies v. InterDigital, Inc. (Guangdong High People's Court, (2013) Yue Gao Fa Min San Zhong Zi No. 306)
Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. v. InterDigital, Inc. (IDC) is widely recognized as China's first case to conduct a substantive antitrust review of standard essential patents. The court found that IDC held a dominant market position in the market for licensing 3G and 4G wireless communication SEPs, and that the royalty rates it charged Huawei were markedly higher than those charged to other manufacturers, constituting unfairly high pricing; IDC also required Huawei to license all of its patents to IDC free of charge during the negotiations, constituting the attachment of unreasonable trading conditions. The case established that SEP holders are subject to an antitrust law obligation to comply with the fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory ("FRAND") licensing principle, and provided a foundational analytical framework for subsequent SEP disputes.
(2) Refusal to License and Essential Facilities — Four Ningbo Companies v. Hitachi Metals ((2015) Zhe Xia Zhong Zi Nos. 137–140)
Four Ningbo-based companies v. Hitachi Metals was China's first judicial case involving the abuse of a dominant market position in relation to non-standard essential patents, and the first intellectual property antitrust case to expressly introduce the essential facilities doctrine. The court of first instance found that the sintered neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) related patents held by Hitachi Metals constituted essential facilities, and that its refusal to license amounted to an abuse of a dominant market position. On appeal, however, the Supreme People's Court did not assess the application of the essential facilities doctrine directly, but instead overturned the first-instance conclusion indirectly by finding that the defendant did not hold a dominant market position. This ruling reflects the cautious attitude of Chinese courts toward applying the essential facilities doctrine in the intellectual property field, and emphasizes the need to avoid undue intervention that would weaken the incentive to innovate.
(3) Patent Settlement Agreements and Reverse Payments — AstraZeneca v. Aosaikang ((2021) Zui Gao Fa Zhi Min Zhong No. 388)
In AstraZeneca v. Aosaikang, concerning a reverse payment agreement over saxagliptin tablets, the court conducted an antitrust review of a settlement agreement in a pharmaceutical patent infringement dispute. A reverse payment agreement is one in which an originator drug company pays a generic drug company in exchange for the latter's agreement to delay market entry; in essence, it divides the market in the name of a patent settlement. Together with another case involving a patent infringement settlement agreement over a non-excitation switch, the case shows that China's judicial practice has begun to focus on the risk of monopoly agreements embedded in patent litigation settlements, and remains highly vigilant against conduct that uses a settlement agreement to conceal horizontal cartel intent.
(4) Copyright Collective Management — Yunnan Damingxing Huanleyuan v. CAVCA ((2017) Yun 01 Min Chu No. 1782)
Yunnan Damingxing Huanleyuan Co. v. the China Audio-Video Copyright Association ("CAVCA") is China's first monopoly dispute directed at a copyright collective management organization. The court found that although CAVCA held a dominant position in the relevant market, its "blanket licensing" model conformed to international practice and the requirements of transactional efficiency, and its fee standards were formulated by the general assembly of members through a transparent procedure; accordingly, no abuse was established. The case clarified the distinction between "dominant market position" and "abuse of a dominant market position," and established the adjudicative rule that the conduct of copyright collective management organizations remains subject to the Anti-Monopoly Law, while lawful authorization and transparent fee-setting are legitimate.
IV. Risk Alerts
For enterprises, compliance risk at the intellectual property–antitrust intersection has evolved from a theoretical topic into a real operational challenge. A risk control system should be established along the following dimensions.
(1) FRAND Compliance in SEP Licensing Strategies
Holders of standard essential patents should refrain from demanding unfairly high royalty rates, engaging in tying sales, or attaching unreasonable trading conditions; implementers should likewise demonstrate good faith in negotiations so as to avoid being characterized as an "unwilling licensee." In technology-intensive industries such as intelligent connected vehicles and communications equipment, enterprises should establish documentation retention mechanisms for SEP licensing negotiations in order to respond to potential antitrust litigation or administrative enforcement.
(2) Antitrust Review of Patent Settlement Agreements
Parties to patent infringement disputes in fields such as pharmaceuticals and chemicals should be alert to clauses involving reverse payments, market allocation, and output restrictions when concluding settlement agreements. Under the 2025 Anti-Monopoly Guidelines for the Pharmaceutical Field, reverse payment patent settlement agreements and product hopping have been expressly brought within the scope of antitrust review; an originator drug company that redesigns its patent strategy to achieve product hopping and thereby obstructs generic competition may be found to have abused a dominant market position.
(3) Awareness of the Boundaries of Refusal to License
An intellectual property holder with a dominant market position that refuses to license, licenses on a discriminatory basis, or imposes excessively high licensing thresholds without justified reasons may trigger antitrust risk. Although Chinese courts take a cautious approach to the essential facilities doctrine, this does not mean that a refusal to license enjoys absolute immunity. Enterprises should assess the substitutability of their intellectual property in the relevant market and the actual impact of a refusal to license on competition in downstream markets.
(4) Filing Obligations for Intellectual Property Concentrations and Patent Pools
Concentrations of undertakings involving intellectual property—such as patent pools, cross-licensing arrangements, or mergers and acquisitions involving core technologies—must be notified for antitrust review in accordance with the law if the turnover-based filing thresholds are met. In addition, the administrators of patent pools must avoid becoming a platform for exchanging sensitive information or coordinating prices, and must guard against degenerating from an efficiency-enhancing instrument into a vehicle for monopoly agreements.
(5) Emerging Risks Driven by Data and Algorithms
With the development of artificial intelligence and the digital economy, novel conduct such as using algorithms to coordinate licensing prices and leveraging data advantages to reinforce intellectual property barriers may trigger dual scrutiny for both abuse of intellectual property rights and antitrust violations. Enterprises should monitor compliance requirements in emerging areas such as improper data acquisition and technology blocking, and should deeply integrate their intellectual property strategy with their antitrust compliance system.
In sum, the intersection of intellectual property and antitrust is a complex, dynamically evolving domain. China has established a preliminary rule system that balances innovation incentives with competition protection. Yet in the face of technological iteration and industrial transformation, only by building a systematic balancing mechanism between intellectual property portfolio strategy and antitrust compliance can an enterprise protect its own innovations while avoiding the forbidden zone of rights abuse.