Possible cartel for spare parts: Consultants should have helped Renault and Peugeot in price agreements

05/31/2018

Possible cartel for spare parts Accenture is said to have helped Renault and Peugeot in price fixing

By Kristina Gnirke, Spiegel Online

DPA

A mechanic works at the bottom of a car

With secret information to Renault and Peugeot Citroën have retracted a billion profit on spare parts. Mastermind of the possible price cartel: One of the largest consulting firms in the world.

For years now, car owners have had to endure the usury for spare parts by the car companies powerless. What nobody knew: Accenture, one of the largest corporate consultancies in the world, helped the French auto companies Renault Show stock market chart and PSA Peugeot Citroën Show stock market chartto further increase the price of visible parts such as fenders or potholders – with a sophisticated software system. On average, the increase was 15 percent. For example, manufacturers in this quasi-monopolistic market have been making a total of 1.5 billion euros for around ten years, possibly even within a price cartel.

Accenture’s action was announced by information from the French online newspaper Mediapart from a court case in Paris. The SPIEGEL has evaluated the documents presented there and other secret documents of the consulting firm with partners from the media network European Investigative Collaborations (EIC) and the Belgian daily De Standaard.

The confidential records show how closely Accenture co-ordinated PSA’s price levels with those of Renault. Even a clandestine meeting between car company executives is said to have happened to the pricing software called Partneo. This makes it possible to raise prices for car parts almost unnoticed. PSA, Renault and Accenture reject the allegations.

Inventor denounces abuse of his software

The inventor of Accentures Software, Laurent Boutboul, has brought the behavior of the management consultancy to light. He sued Accenture because he saw himself under-paid to Accenture after selling his company Acceria, including the Partneo software, eight years ago.

At the same time, Boutboul accuses the consulting firm in court of having abused its program in order to allow an anticompetitive arrangement of spare parts prices between car manufacturers. Emails and documents, which are now in court, prove the allegations.

Boutboul does not want to comment on confidential information. On request, he says that the dispute over Accenture’s obligation to comply with the competition rules established in his company.

Boutboul is not alone in his allegations. Also documents of Accentures lawyers and consultants place a heavy burden on the management consultancy. E-mails indicate that they warned against the risk that competition authorities could hold the consulting firm as the intermediary of a price cartel in the aftermarket.

Accenture had “informed PSA that Renault uses the same algorithms and formulas for price definitions as PSA”, and then Accenture “helped PSA increase its prices in the same proportion as Renault’s,” an attorney said according to court records compliance consultant. A lawyer from Accenture in London previously warned against “competition risks” through the use of Partneo.

With Partneo, Boutpoul has created a software whose algorithm filters out what car owners are willing to pay for spare parts. Otherwise, the prices for replacement parts are usually calculated with a multiplier on the production costs. Partneo accurately analyzes the parts, divides them into groups and aligns their prices with the most expensive spare part of these families. So it comes to price increases of 20 to 300 percent. In 2006 Boutboul founded his company Acceria.

In order to avoid price increases, Partneo increases the price of spare parts – usually the ones most in demand – 20 percent of the parts are cheaper, the rest remains unchanged.

Accenture & Acceria

Price proposals with Partneo from the presentation of Accenture at PSA

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