South Korean anti-trust authorities have fined two Japanese automotive parts manufacturers for colluding to fix prices, according to local reports.
The South Korean Fair Trade Commission (FTC) found Denso Corporation and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) had colluded in 2009 on bid prices for the supply of scroll type air conditioner compressors supplied to General Motors Korea.
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MHI eventually won the contract to supply up to 1m compressors.
The FTC imposed a fine of KRW7.4bn (US$6.4m) on MHI and KRW3.7bn on Denso this week.
MHI has sales and aftersales operations in South Korea covering a broad range of industries and licenses product technology to local manufacturers. Denso directly owns a number of automotive component manufacturing operations in the country.
The FTC said it has successfully investigated eight cases of price fixing among global automotive component manufacturers in the last two years and has vowed continue to protect South Korean businesses and consumers from international cartels.
