FAS of Russia advocates the “third wheel” rule transformation

Igor Artemyev, the Head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service of Russia, spoke about his agency’s position on the current use of “third wheel” rule in public procurement of drugs, when a foreign company can no longer participate in a tender if there are two Russian companies.

When asked whether FAS will propose to abolish this rule, Igor Artemyev said,

“We are not against the “third wheel”, we advocate some fairly substantial transformation of the concept. I know for sure at least two cases when a foreign company asked a billion rubles less for its products than the Russian companies. Our Russian companies “valiantly” refused to reduce the price and squeezed out a billion more from the state budget. But do we have to encourage this?”

Therefore, added the head of the antimonopoly agency, we say that if a foreigner offers a price, which is 25%-30% lower, then we should buy from a foreigner; No more “breeding” such “domestic manufacturers.” As far as I know, this position now prevails in the government but, at the beginning, the FAS was alone, everyone was against it. If now the government adopts the additions to its decree, we will be satisfied.

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