The Competition Authority of Kenya (CAK) has begun investigations into six foam mattress manufacturers and distributors for suspicion of engaging in anticompetitive behaviour.
A dawn raid by the body on business premises by the firms across four counties led to confiscation of electronic and physical evidence for further forensic analysis into conducts of the firms.
CAK seeks to confirm the existence of restrictive trade practices such as abuse of dominance, collusive tendering, price fixing, and market or customer allocation.
“Foam mattresses are an essential household commodity, used by millions of Kenyan consumers. Our intervention seeks to establish whether collusive practices are undermining the affordability and accessibility of these products for ordinary households,” said David Kemei, CAK Director-General.
The operation which was conducted simultaneously in Nairobi, Machakos, Kisumu and Kiambu follows intelligence from market surveillance which showed suspected concerted practices of a cartel nature between the competitors.
Evidence collected among others include, hard disks and thumb drives, laptops, mobile phones, management reports, and sales records.
“Based on our experience handling complex cases, this investigation is reasonably expected to take several months to complete. However, our proactive measures such as upskilling our case officers, installation of an in-house modern forensic laboratory, and thorough planning ahead of the searches will improve the case completion time,” added Kemei.
CAK said it will make a decision on the next cause of action after reviewing the evidence.
