Nine Japanese Suppliers Plead Guilty in U.S. Price-Fixing Probe

The U.S. Dept. of Justice says nine Japanese auto suppliers and two executives have pleaded guilty to rigging prices on 30 auto components, including those used in some 25 million vehicles sold in America.

The suppliers will pay more than $740 million in fines. The two executives each will pay a $20,000 criminal fine and serve a prison term of 12 months and one day and 14 months, respectively.

The Justice Dept. says some of the companies conspired with others for a decade or more to rig prices on a wide range of items, including bearings, electrical components, electric motors, engine parts, vibration damping products and air-conditioning systems.

The new pleas bring to 20 companies and 21 employees the number of admissions of guilt so far. The Justice Dept. has collected more than $1.6 billion in the past two years in its continuing price-fixing probe, which is part of a global investigation that includes authorities in Europe and Japan.

The latest corporate guilty pleas and fines are:

• Hitachi Automotive Systems ($195 million)
• Jtek Corp. ($103 million)
• Mitsuba Corp. ($135 million)
• Mitsubishi Electric Corp. ($190 million)
• Mitsubishi Heavy Industries ($15 million)
• NSK ($68 million)
• T-Rad Co. ($14 million)
• Valeo Japan Co. ($14 million)
• Yamashita Rubber Co. ($11 million)

The Justice Dept. identifies the two former executives who pleaded guilty as Gary Walker and Tetsuya Kunida but doesn't reveal the names of the companies for whom they work.