Moscow OFAS exposed a cartel at an auction of a Traffic Management Centre

The antimonopoly body exposed an anticompetitive agreement between “RusGard” CJSC and “Paravan-2000” Ltd. in the course of an auction for supplying spare parts for peripheral equipment of a teleview system.*

The ordering party was the Traffic Management Centre of the Moscow Government.

According to Moscow OFAS, “RusGard” and “Paravan-2000” acted in the interests of each other at the auction, which resulted in maintaining the auction price. It allowed “RusGard” CJSC to win the auction with 0.5% reduction from the original contract price for 19.8 million RUB.

OFAS found that “RusGard” CJSC and “Paravan-2000” Ltd. violated the Federal Law “On Protection of Competition” (Clause 2 Part 1 Article 11).

In the near future, an administrative case will be opened against “RusGard” CJSC and “Paravan-2000” Ltd. Part 1 Article 14.32 of the Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Violations provides for administrative fines for anticompetitive agreements – from 10% to 50% of the initial minimum costs of the auction subject.

Moscow OFAS emphasized: “Since there was practically no competition between potential suppliers, the Traffic Management Centre [State Public Institution] was forced to purchase spare parts for the peripherals of a teleview system at significantly overrated prices. Practice shows that price reductions in the course of ‘fair” auctions reach a significant percentage of the initial maximum contract price”.

*Colour rotating TV-camera, video signal coding equipment, rotational video-camera, data processing and transmittance control cabinet, media-converter in set with a power box and steel zinc-plated supporting structure 12 m, in set with metalware and a pediment.