CADE recommends conviction of IT company in international cartel

On 27 December 2024, the Office of the Superintendent General at CADE (SG) recommended the conviction of a company and 3 individuals for international cartel in the global market of suspension assemblies, which impacted Brazil.

 Suspension assembly is a component of hard disk drives (HDDs) which storages data. It is used in several devices, such as personal computers (PCs - desktops and laptops), video recorders, games, MP3 players, navigation softwares, and systems for cars and smartphones.

 According to the SG, the cartel established anticompetitive agreements involving market allocation, price fixing, and exchange of commercial and competitively sensitive information, therefore, controlling the market.The alleged violations occured from 2003 to April 2016.

The administrative proceeding will be submitted to the Tribunal of CADE and assigned to a Rapporteur for a close analysis and subsequent adjudication. If convicted, the company is subject to fines up to 20% of its turnover, while administrators may be fined up to 20% of the amount imposed to their company.

Access Case no. 08700.006006/2017-61.