Tearing down the 'Walled Gardens' among China’s Tech Giants

Abstract

The paper attempts two primary objectives. Firstly, it explores the extant literature to articulate the theories at the background of the fundamental properties and platform business models driving the Chinese digital economy. It further highlights the challenges and opportunities these data-driven innovators pose to Chinese consumers and financial market efficiency, particularly competition and competitiveness (monopoly), stability and consumer data privacy protection. Secondly, it provides and overview of the consumer-centric framework in the recent Chinese Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL) and a critical analyse of the possibilities and drawbacks of the newly introduced right to data portability in Article 45. The use of theories and analysis in the paper is intended to provide a deep understanding of the new consumer-centric framework within the Chinese data governance regime and the areas in need of further regulatory interventions.