The food delivery war in China just got (some kind of?) a formal timeout—called by the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR).
In early May, SAMR, together with four other major government bodies—the Central Social Work Department, the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, and the Ministry of Commerce—jointly summoned JD, Meituan, Ele.me, and other platform companies for a regulatory meeting on the intense and increasingly chaotic competition in the food delivery industry.
At the meeting, the platforms were instructed to:
- Comply fully with laws like the E-Commerce Law, Anti-Unfair Competition Law, and Food Safety Law
- Take primary responsibility for operations and actively fulfill social obligations
- Strengthen internal governance and compete fairly and legally
- Safeguard the rights of consumers, merchants, and delivery workers
- And support a stable, sustainable development of the platform economy
It’s rare to see five top-level departments move in concert like this unless things are getting messy at scale. After months of escalating subsidy battles and marketing theatrics, regulators clearly decided it was time to reassert some order.
The message is clear: coupon wars are fun—but not if they start undermining labor protections, market fairness, or basic governance.
Perhaps, once the discounts start hitting regulators’ dashboards, it’s no longer a promo—it’s a policy problem.