The European Commission has launched a probe to examine how China favours its domestic companies in tenders for medical devices and weigh possible tit-for-tat measures.

Brussels has long accused Beijing of employing distorting and discriminatory practices that make it all but impossible for European companies to win public contracts in China in the valuable sector of medical devices, where the bloc still retains a competitive edge.

These practices include stringent certification processes, opaque approval systems, clauses to safeguard “national interests” and demands for abnormally low prices that foreign manufacturers are simply unable to meet. Due to a “Buy China” policy, the EU’s medical device industry has repeatedly decried that Chinese public tenders previously open to imports now specifically request China-made products.

Germany, the Netherlands, Ireland, France, Belgium and Italy are among the world’s leading exporters of medical appliances, some of them with high technological added value such as X-ray machines or pacemakers, some of more commonly used like contact lenses and sticking plasters.