Self-Preferencing in Korea and Japan

The growing influence of big technology companies in the markets has brought multiple competition law cases around the world. At the same time, new theories of harm involving the conduct of big techs have resulted in discussions of new digital regulations or digital competition rules. The competition cases of self-preferencing are the starting point of these discussions. There are numerous antitrust cases dealing with self-preferencing in the European Union (EU) and Asia, particular in Korea and Japan. We have seen notable similarities between the West and the East. However, there are some differences between the competition regimes in the implementation of competition rules. The competition regimes in Korea and Japan have unique provisions on unfair trade practices (UTPs) that can widely deal with unfair conduct, including self-preferencing of algorithmic changes or manipulations that can harm third parties and/or consumers. Given the importance of business models involving algorithms, it is timely to analyse the self-preferencing cases in Korea and Japan and discuss the similarities and differences in the dialogues on digital regulations.