The antitrust regulator announced fines for 48 furniture manufacturers and suppliers for colluding in bids for built-in furniture ordered by construction companies. The companies will collectively pay a fine of 25 billion won for fixing winning bidders or bid prices between September 2013 and May 2022, as reported by the Fair Trade Commission (FTC). This collusion affected 240 bidding processes from 54 construction companies.
Enex Co. faces the highest penalty of 5.84 billion won, followed by Hanssem Co. with a fine of 3.8 billion won, according to the FTC. Built-in furniture includes fixtures like kitchen cabinets and built-in closets installed during construction in apartments and offices. Meanwhile, Coupang, a prominent e-commerce company in South Korea, received substantial fines from the FTC over the past three years.
Coupang was fined a total of 162.8 billion won from the first half of 2022 to the first half of this year, as per a parliamentary report. The fines were imposed for manipulating search algorithms to boost the “Coupang ranking” of its products. Hyundai Motor Group, the top carmaker, faced cumulative fines of 119.4 billion won, followed by poultry-processing company Harim Group with 101.6 billion won and SK Group with 64.5 billion won.
The top 10 conglomerates were fined a total of 744.6 billion won over the three-year period. Hyundai Department Store Group had the highest number of violations, totaling 38, mainly due to collusion cases involving its furniture affiliate Hyundai Livart Furniture. Hanssem Co. followed with 33 violations, SK Group with 31, and Enex Co. with 28 violations. In total, the top 10 companies breached antitrust laws 243 times during the mentioned period.
