Disgraced Gome Electrical Appliance founder Huang Guangyu has had his 14-year prison sentence upheld by a Beijing court. Huang had lodged an appeal against the considerable length of the sentence he received for insider trading and bribery. His wife, Du Juan, convicted on similar charges, was released on parole. Depite facing more than ten years [...]
Guangdong province is drafting a new regulation stipulating the use of a “collective negotiation mechanism” to resolve labor disputes, a move to help ease tense labor relations in the booming province where a number of industrial strikes have occurred recently. The negotiation mechanism should be used if more than 25% of all workers in a [...]
European Union Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht criticized China’s procurement rules and called for a more open market. De Gucht, who spoke at the Shanghai 2010 World Expo, called on China to create a more transparent regulatory environment for its procurements market. D e Gucht’s remarks come after Chinese officials faced sharp criticism from European [...]
American geologist Xue Feng convicted of stealing secret information about China’s oil industry has received an eight year prison sentence under the country’s state secrets law. According to US-based rights group The Dui Hua Foundation, the case against Xue came about from his attempt to purchase a database on China’s oil industry when working for [...]
China has published guidelines as to what constitutes a commercial secret following criticism of its opaque definition of the term during the recent trial of Rio Tinto executives. The State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission put out a notice instructing companies to “attach great importance to the protection of commercial secrets.” The notice defines as [...]
Huang Guangyu, former chairman of Gome Electrical Appliances Holdings, finally began his trial in Beijing for a wide variety of alleged commercial crimes. Once the richest man in China, Huang stands charged with illegal foreign exchange trading in Hong Kong in 2007, insider trading on the Shenzhen exchange, and bribing officials – many of whom [...]
Australian miner Rio Tinto has issued new guidelines for its employees engaged in information gathering in China after four employees were convicted of stealing commercial secrets. However, in its annual meeting last Thursday, company leadership came close to expressing skepticism over the grounds for the conviction: “We know that there are different definitions of business [...]
According to the Chinese General Administration of Customs (GAC), customs officials seized approximately 37,000 packages containing counterfeit items between June and December of 2009, up 738% from the same period in 2008. Customs officials blamed the growth of “e-business” for the drastic increase. Most of the counterfeit goods were destined for export, and ordinary mail [...]
A court in New Orleans has ruled that Chinese firm Taishan Gypsum is liable for $2.6 million in damages due to its defective drywall products. However, since Taishan Gypsum is owned by the Chinese government and there are no international laws that would require the Chinese drywall company to honor America court decisions, “there is [...]
Stern Hu, the Rio Tinto executive accused of bribery and stealing commercial secrets, was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Monday. Hu and his three likewise-accused Chinese colleagues admitted to accepting $13.6 million in bribes from private steel mills trying to avoid purchasing iron ore at higher prices from state-run mills. According to Chinese [...]
