BMW Headquarters were raided by officials from the European Commission for Competition over allegations of a price fixing collusion cartel which involve several German automobile companies such as Dialmer, Volkswagen, Porsche, and Audi.
Back in July, Der Speigel, a German magazine claimed that the aforementioned companies had been meeting secretly since the 1990s to collude on the pricing of certain technologies, components, suppliers, and various other illicit agreements. Dialmer, one of the companies involved acknowledged that it had reported the issue to the authorities thus blowing the cover on the cartel and applied for immunity in order to mitigate its penalties. According to earlier reports, Volkswagen is also believed to be a beneficiary of leniency after it shared information pertaining to the cartel.
According to European Union laws, companies involved in undetected cartels can gain immunity/leniency if they are the first to disclose sufficient information about the operation of the cartel.
In response to the investigation, the BMW Group said it was cooperating with the authorities and further added “The BMW Group wishes to make clear the distinction between potential violations of antitrust law on the one hand and illegal manipulation of exhaust gas treatment on the other, the BMW Group has not been accused of the latter.”
European Commission for Competition is yet to initiate formal proceedings against any of the automobile companies.
Relevant Links :
Reuters
Der Spiegel (original report from July)
This blog was authored by Ravi Shankar from West Bengal University of Juridical Sciences. Kolkata.
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