FAS EXPOSED A CARTEL ON THE MARKET OF IT-SERVICES

“RegionCom” Ltd. and “Progress Soft” Ltd. violated the antimonopoly law

FAS found that the anticompetitive agreement was implemented at 22 auctions assigning government contracts on IT-services for the needs of public sector entities in 2015-2016. The total amount of the initial maximum contract prices reached around 140 million RUB.

The cartel scheme was as follows: its members refused to compete at auctions divided the auctions between themselves.

They created a “formal” veneer of competition for the auctions organized by public and municipal bodies and maintained initial maximum contract prices. Often the auction bidders that lost the auctions became subcontractors for the contracts.

The cartel participants did not deny the fact of the cartel and refused to further participate in it.

FAS found that “RegionCom” Ltd. and “Progress Soft” Ltd. violated Clause 2 Part 11 of the Federal Law “On protection of Competition”.

“Exposing and suppressing cartels in digital technologies is one of the FAS priorities”, pointed out Deputy Head of FAS Anti-Cartel Department, Andrey Tenishev.