September 28, 2023
Japan Fair Trade Commission
The Japan Fair Trade Commission (hereinafter referred to as the “JFTC”) today issued cease and desist orders and surcharge payment orders against participants in biddings for geological investigation procured by Kochi Prefecture.
The JFTC found (i) that the 14 participants had conspired and agreed to decide prospective winners and to bid at prices allowing those winners to win geological investigation procured by Kochi Prefecture; (ii) that based on the agreements, they coordinated and agreed on a winner of participants for each geological investigation procurement in advance and allowed the winner to be successful in the biding; (iii) that above-mentioned conduct had been conducted since April 2017 at the latest. By engaging in this conduct, the 14 participants substantially restrained competition in the field of the geological investigation procured by Kochi Prefecture, contrary to the public interest.
The conduct fall under unreasonable restraint of trade prescribed in Article 2, paragraph (6) of the Antimonopoly Act (hereinafter referred to simply as the “Act”) and the participants violated Article 3 of the Act. The total amount of surcharge is 86.26 million yen.
*This announcement is tentative translation. Please refer to the original text written in Japanese for more details.
