POSCO Group Proactively Prevents Collusion Damage Among Group Companies

Last Year, Industry's First Bid Rigging Prevention Task Force Launched

POSCO. Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

POSCO Group is strengthening its efforts to prevent bid-rigging damages at the group level by establishing a “Bid-Rigging Damage Prevention Task Force (TF)” involving major group companies.

POSCO Group’s “Bid-Rigging Damage Prevention TF,” formed in December last year, consists of six companies: POSCO Holdings, POSCO, POSCO E&C, POSCO Future M, POSCO Flow, and N2B. The TF evaluates the risk of bid-rigging damages for each group company, identifies areas for improvement, and carries out various activities to prevent bid-rigging damages in advance.

Over the past year, the “Bid-Rigging Damage Prevention TF” analyzed various bid-related data from each group company and created and distributed customized verification checklists that allow the relevant contracting departments to detect signs of collusion in advance. It also analyzed factors that could lead to bid-rigging under the current contracting system and developed improvement measures such as appropriate price bidding systems and expanding the pool of suppliers. Additionally, specific operational procedures were established and disseminated to each group company to enable prompt reporting and response if signs of bid-rigging are detected among the group’s business partners.

POSCO Group has achieved excellent ratings in the Fair Trade Commission’s Compliance Program (CP) evaluations by continuously conducting fair trade *CP activities for over 20 years, spreading CP across all group companies, and producing tangible results. Based on this, it is also the first private company to implement a group-wide autonomous compliance program in the field of “Bid-Rigging Damage Prevention.”

CP (Compliance Program) is an internal compliance system operated by companies to adhere to fair trade-related laws and regulations. The Fair Trade Commission (entrusted to the Korea Fair Trade Mediation Agency) conducts CP rating evaluations for applicant companies and provides incentives such as reduced administrative sanctions for excellent companies.

In particular, POSCO Group has continuously worked to spread a systematic fair trade culture between POSCO Group and its suppliers by leveraging group-level fair trade CP synergies, including internal compliance support activities, establishing bid-rigging prevention processes for suppliers (partners) of each group company, and supporting the activation of suppliers’ own fair trade CPs. Furthermore, the group has conducted ongoing company-wide special training on bid-rigging damage cases and monitoring methods, and has enhanced compliance awareness by informing suppliers (partners) about bid-rigging regulations and penalties for violations.

POSCO Group plans to continue its best efforts to spread the CP culture at the group level and to create a fair and robust industrial ecosystem with its business partners, based on its management philosophy of “Corporate Citizenship.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.