Consumer protection. The definition of "unfair competition" is expanded to expressly include acts that undermine the legitimate rights and interests of consumers.

Redundant and conflicting rules. Rules have been removed that prescribe specific anti-competitive acts, but that are governed under other, more specific laws.

Intellectual property. The revised law also removes trade mark protections, which are governed by the Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China 2013, and refines the offence of passing off by prohibiting the use of another business operator's logo, trade name or domain name, or an individual's name, or any similar act that is likely to cause confusion in the market.

Commercial bribery. Commercial bribery is defined as an offer of property (or other means) to an employee or advisor of a counterparty, or an entity or individual with influence over a transaction, to seek a transaction opportunity or competitive advantage. Liability is imposed on an employer for the bribery acts of its employees, unless the employer can prove that the employee's acts were irrelevant to the transaction opportunity or competitive advantage.

E-commerce. New offences are created prohibiting acts that obstruct or disrupt the lawful provision of products or services over the internet. All other offences of unfair competition are expressly applied to violations committed over the internet.

Promotional activities. Various refinements are made to the prohibitions against false and misleading commercial promotions and third parties who facilitate these activities, and the protections and offences involving the offer of prizes to induce sales.

Trade secrets. The definition of "trade secret" is changed to include information with a commercial value that is not known to the public. The offence is expanded to include current and former employees or other entities or individuals who improperly obtain a trade secret.

Investigations. The revised law expands and clarifies the investigative powers of administrative agencies and expands the protections and specifies the procedures for supporting whistleblowers.

Liability. The revised law enhances the enforcement powers of administrative agencies by increasing the amount and range of administrative penalties and requiring the public shaming of offenders and provides a legal basis for mitigating or eliminating administrative punishment in some circumstances.

Prepare and archive written reports on each review.

Conduct periodic assessments after a policy measure is issued to determine its impact on competition and the relevant national market.

Market entry and exit standards.

Standards on the free circulation of goods and services.

Standards that affect production and operating costs.

Standards that affect production and operating behaviour.

Protect national economic security, cultural security or national defence.

Alleviate poverty, provide disaster relief or protect the environment.

Protect other public interests.

Amending the list of illustrative examples of creditors' rights in the definition of "accounts receivable" to include examples of specific types of services (and a different set of examples of infrastructure projects) and catch-all clauses to cover the proceeds to all types of infrastructure and public utility projects and all other monetised, contract-based creditors' rights.

Adding a definition of "pledge over accounts receivable". The definition is tied to Article 223 of the Property Law of the People's Republic of China 2007 and refers to situations where a debtor or a third party pledges to pay, as a security for an underlying debt, to a creditor on a priority basis the proceeds from specific accounts receivable the creditor holds, in the event that the debtor fails to satisfy the underlying debt or any other pre-agreed circumstance occurs.

Expanding the scope of the registration system to include assignments of accounts receivable, if the purpose of the assignment is for financing.

Updating the list of contents of a pledge registration to include the pledgee and pledgor's unified social credit code and global legal entity identifier.

Adjusting the valid registration period of a pledge over accounts receivable, as well as any extensions to the validity period, to between six months and 30 years, determined in accordance with the performance period for the underlying debt.

Revising the procedures for a pledgor or other interested party to challenge the contents of a pledge registration by requiring them to provide notice within seven days of registering an objection and to file suit or apply for arbitration within 30 days of registering an objection, and clarifying that they bear liability if they cause damage by providing false materials in relation to a pledge registration.

Registration requirements. Foreign-invested funds and their foreign-invested fund managers must be registered in Shenzhen. The pilot measures also clarify the process and timing for registration, as well as preliminary reviews of registration applications by the municipal market and quality supervision commission and the municipal finance bureau.

Choice of vehicle. Foreign-invested fund managers may be established as wholly foreign-owned enterprises or Sino-foreign equity joint ventures, as well as foreign-invested partnership enterprises. Foreign-invested funds must be established as foreign-invested partnership enterprises.

Business scope. Foreign-invested fund managers are permitted to manage foreign-invested funds, as well as domestic private equity and venture capital funds, but are prohibited from directly investing in projects. Qualified domestic-invested fund managers are permitted to manage foreign-invested funds. Foreign-invested funds must invest in accordance with the foreign investment catalogue, may only invest in industry projects directly, and may not invest in so-called "fund of funds" or other indirect investment targets. (For more information on the foreign investment catalogue, see Article, 2017 foreign investment catalogue: the debut of nationwide negative list in China.)

Investor qualifications and restrictions. The pilot measures clarify the qualifications thresholds for foreign investors and stipulate the qualifications requirements for domestic investors. Where a general partner and a limited partner in a foreign-invested fund have a common controlling shareholder, capital contributions from the common shareholder are capped at 50%.

Expanded scope. The outbound investment regime expressly applies to financial enterprises and non-financial enterprises and incorporates the concept of control to include investment carried out by an offshore entity under an onshore entity’s control. In addition, the draft measures apply to the outbound investments of overseas enterprises or enterprises in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan that are controlled by mainland Chinese natural persons. ODI by Chinese natural persons are not covered under the draft measures.

Simplified approval procedure. The separate procedure involving submission of a project information report for projects with domestic investment of USD300 million or above is no longer required. The requirements for approval and record-filing are also changed. Approval is now required only for sensitive projects directly or in-directly invested in by domestic enterprises, and the definitions of "sensitive countries and regions" and "sensitive industries" are revised. Record-filing is required for non-sensitive projects directly invested in by domestic enterprises. Investors may directly carry out record-filing with the NDRC or its local counterpart without obtaining preliminary approval. For any non-sensitive indirect investment of USD300 million or above, investors are only required to submit a project information reporting form through the NDRC designated online platform.

Deadline for obtaining approval or record-filing extended to transaction completion. Investors must obtain approval or complete record-filing prior to implementing an outbound investment project, but are not prohibited from concluding a binding agreement before obtaining these documents. The validity period for approval and record-filing is extended to two years on all outbound projects.

Change of approval or record-filing. The situations where an application to amend an approval or record-filing are clarified, and deadlines for official written decisions on these applications are specified.

Unfair competition and enforcement. A provision against unfair competition is included, as are increased disciplinary measures and new public shaming measures.