Recently, eight departments, including the State Administration of Market Regulation ("SAMR"), have jointly issued the Opinions on Operating the Enterprise Standard Pioneer System (the "Opinions").
The Opinions state that, by 2020, enterprises' product and service standards will be all made public voluntarily by enterprises themselves, and more than 20 percent of published enterprise standards will be stricter than national standards and industry standards. Further, the Opinions set out six major tasks, including "implementing the self-disclosure mechanism for enterprises' product and service standards in all aspects", "establishing the assessment mechanism for pioneers" and "issuing the ranking list for enterprise standards". Moreover, the Opinions expressly state that actions will be taken to improve the incentive policy, encourage the government to select products or services that meet relevant standards under the enterprise standard pioneer mechanism, under the same conditions during the government procurement process, and inspire private investors to set up specialized funds for pioneers in a market-oriented manner. Furthermore, the Opinions stress that where an enterprise fails to have its products or services meet the standards it has published, the assessment agency shall promptly disqualify this enterprise from the title as a pioneer and make public such disqualification. An enterprise will not be allowed to participate in the assessment for three years from the time its title has been cancelled.