Antitrust officials from Germany and investigators from the European Union have begun an investigation into collusion and have raided the offices of Daimler, Volkswagen and BMW on account of alleged collusion between the German automakers. The investigation gained momentum when Daimler disclosed that it had sought whistleblower status to avoid fines in the matter. At the same time, the authorities were searching through records at the BMW’s headquarters in the Munich. Investigators have been searching offices of Daimler and examining documents at Volkswagen’s headquarters in Wolfsburg and at its Audi offices in the city of Ingolstadt, spokespeople at Daimler and VW said.
German magazine Der Spiegel reported in July that Volkswagen, its units Porsche and Audi, Daimler’s Mercedes and BMW may have used industry committee meetings to fix the size of tanks for AdBlue, a liquid used to treat nitrogen oxide in diesel emissions. Volkswagen is also under investigation for colluding with BMW and Daimler.
It isn’t unusual for automakers to band together to research and development to hold down costs and in many cases it’s perfectly legal under the laws in both North America and Europe. General Motors and Ford, for example, jointly developed a new multi-speed automatic transmission that’s now being moved into production. But illegal activities could revolve around price fixing on certain components and deliberately agreeing not to use certain technology.
This post has been authored by Aparmita Pratap of West Bengal National University Juridical Sciences, Kolkata.
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