The Office punished a cartel of regional construction companies
The bid rigging cartel agreement was concluded within a tender procedure for the revitalisation of a block of flats awarded by the community of unit owners of a particular flat house in 2020. According to documents and communications found by the Office, the undertakings concerned illegally cooperated with each other and coordinated respective budgets within their bids. They subsequently submitted such coordinated bids to the contracting authority, with the most advantageous bid being submitted by aostav s.r.o., thereby distorting competition.
When calculating the fines, the Office based its assessment on the value of the public contract in question, which exceeded CZK 11.5 million. All the parties to the proceedings fulfilled the conditions for a settlement procedure; thus, the fines imposed on them were reduced by 20%. The Office imposed a higher fine on aostav s.r.o. for its leading role in the cartel, while the fine on the natural person K. K. was reduced so as not to have an eliminating effect.
The resulting fines for the individual cartel members are stated below:
aostav s.r.o. CZK 1,110,000
EFIOS stavební s.r.o. CZK 925,000
HERYÁN RECONSTRUCTIONS s.r.o. CZK 925,000
an entrepreneur K. K. CZK 197,000
Press Unit of the Office for the Protection of Competition
23/16 – S0163/2022
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