HE High Court of Justice of the Commonwealth of Valencia The Valencia Community has approved a fine of 16,801.7 euros imposed on the company from Castellón in 2020 by the Commission for the Defense of Competition. SA Ports CommunicationThe ownership of Francis Puig, brother of the Generalitat president, due to a very serious violation, as just published by the Efe agency.
The sanction imposed by this body of Generalitat was based on the fact that the aforementioned company, together with three other companies in the same industry, competed with almost identical offers in a tender for the service of the audio-visual resources of the Public Limited Company of İletişim Medya. Community Valencia.
The Fourth Division of the Disputed Chamber understands that in this case “competitive behavior called a cartel” is mediated, meaning an agreement between companies in the same industry whose purpose is to reduce or eliminate competition in a particular market, to gain power over the market. achieve the greatest possible benefits at the expense of consumers”.
“The four companies in the dossier used four types or models of offers with the same prices in the four preference concepts used for the decision,” the judges point out.
The Chamber dismissed all the grounds the sanctioned company had put forward in its appeal against the administrative decision, but the penalty was not final and could be appealed before the TSJCV itself or the Supreme Court.
Background
Generalitat’s Anti-Competition Commission approved at the end of 2020 Port Communications With a fine of 16,801 euros; Canal Maestrat and Kriol Produccions were jointly and severally fined 26,103 euros and Visualiza 3,337 euros.
In its decision, the Commission also agreed to refer it to the State Public Contracts Advisory Board for the purposes set out in Article 71 of the Law on Public Sector Contracts; that is, to ask violating companies to refrain from engaging in behavior similar to those identified and punishable in the future, and to encourage the Ministry of Economy to monitor full compliance with this decision.
The tender for these “reporters” was published in January 2019. contract divided into twelve partseach refers to one or more neighboring regions to cover the whole of the Community and, according to the Commission’s decision, the initiated companies were informed before the tender is published and under what conditions.
According to the Commission, which has questioned the independence or real autonomy of the bids submitted by the companies under investigation, the four companies submitted their bids on the same day, 12 February, at the same prices in the four concepts.
Therefore, the Valencian Competition Defense Commission appreciated the market distribution of lots 1, 2 and 3 of the tender, through the “coordinated submission of identical offers that can legally be classified as a cartel” – in this case. . .