NMa: no fines for fluid-concrete producers and Solétanche

The Netherlands Competition Authority (NMa) has reversed its decisions to impose fines on international, geotechnical and civil engineering contractor Solétanche Bachy France S.A. and on ten Dutch fluid-concrete producers.

Solétanche
A ruling of the District Court of Rotterdam has led the NMa to decide not to impose a fine on Solétanche. The court argued that the NMa had insufficiently motivated its 2003 decision, which included the fine. It furthermore argued that, in particular, further investigation into the economic and legal context of the case was needed. The NMa finds such an investigation not to be expedient at this time, also when considering the amount of time that has lapsed since the time period that would have been the subject of further investigation, which would be the period 2001-2002. The NMa therefore decided not to impose a fine on Solétanche.

Fluid-concrete producers
Having received complaints of the undertakings involved, the NMa has also decided not to impose fines on ten Dutch fluid-concrete producers. The NMa imposed fines of €6 million on these companies in 2006. The undertakings in question were to have exchanged information among each other about price increases of fluid concrete during the period of 1998 until 2002. The NMa decided not to impose these fines, because it could not be ascertained that all undertakings were involved in the violation. No significant impediment to competition could therefore be established in this case. The NMa believes it is unlikely that a further investigation would result in the NMa being able to establish individual involvement of each undertaking, and, with it, a significant impediment to competition. The fines on the following undertakings are thus revoked:

• Betonmortelfabriek Utrecht 'Befu' B.V.
• Betonmortelcentrale De Lek B.V.
• Houdstermaatschappij Betonmortelcentrale De Lek B.V.
• Betonmortelcentrale Gorkum B.V.
• Goudse Betonmortel Centrale B.V.
• Betoncentrale Papendrecht B.V.
• Van der Velden Betonmortel Centrale B.V.
• Van Nieuwpoort Betonmortel B.V.
• Van Nieuwpoort Nederland B.V.
• Mebin B.V.
• ENCI Holding N.V.
• Transportbeton Diemen B.V.
• Pioneer International B.V.
• NCD Betonmortelgroep B.V. and
• Hanson Beton Nederland B.V.