An investigation by the Korea Fair Trade Commission (KFTC) has found that some of GTT’s commercial practices related to LNG carrier construction broke competition regulations over the past four years.
The agency has fined the French membrane-type containment system designer €9.5m ($11.3m).
The commission has asked that GTT allow South Korean shipyards which request it to perform all or part of the technical assistance services that are currently included in GTT’s technology licence.
It slapped an administrative expenses fine on the company.
“GTT wishes to emphasise that the licence of the technology and the technical assistance constitute an inseparable offering, which guarantees the integrity of its technologies, and that any separation could be detrimental to the entire LNG carrier industry,” GTT said.
It said it challenges the rationale of this decision and intends to appeal against it, with a request for suspension of the decision, before the Seoul High Court.
Paris-listed GTT said it does not expect a significant financial or industrial impact in the short or medium term.
Depending on the conclusions of the appeal procedure, it said it will reassess the consequences on its activities.
GTT chairman and chief executive Philippe Berterottiere said: “We are convinced that our commercial practices comply with the Korean competition rules and that the structuring of our offer, which has contributed for decades to the safe development of LNG maritime transport, makes it possible to provide our shipyard partners with ever more innovative, safe and efficient technologies, for the benefit of the entire industry.”
The long-running KFTC inquiry came to court in October in South Korea, with GTT sending lawyers and officials to the hearing.
The investigation has been running since 2016 but the friction between the country’s shipbuilders and GTT, which has dominated the LNG cargo containment sector with its membrane technology, has been boiling away for closer to 15 years.
Yards build GTT's membrane-type containment systems under licence agreements, with a charge made per newbuilding. But shipbuilders want to take on the technical assistance for the construction and installation of its systems — work that GTT currently carries out.
South Korean yards are also pushing forward with their own rival LNG cargo containment systems and bunker tanks for LNG-fuelled vessels.
