Unfair competition - Heineken Case

 Restricting product distribution in the beer market

Based on reports from public media and provided by the Saigon Beer - Alcohol - Beverage Corp (Sabeco) regarding Heineken Vietnam Brewery Limited Company (Heineken Vietnam) has a policy restricting its agents from selling and/or displaying Sabeco's beer products, such as Saigon Chill beer, VCCA has arranged meetings with relevant parties to collect and verify information:

At the meetings, some distributors/agents of Heineken confirmed that there was some sales staff of Heineken Vietnam asked them (without any official written notification) to implement policy that restricts agents from selling/displaying SABECO's beer products.

The behavior requiring distributors/agents to restrict the distribution of othwr enterprise’s products will affect the freedom of doing business of distributors and therefore limit the right to choose products of consumers.

On that basis, at the official request of VCCA, Heineken Vietnam has issued and published an official notice requesting all sales staff nationwide to strictly comply with regulations on competition law and the to implement Heineken's internal codes of conduct in doing their business activities.

In order to maintain a healthy and fair competitive environment, ensuring consumers’ interests in comsumption, VCCA has recommended that enterprises in the field of beer production and distribution need to strictly comply with the law on competition; revising and eliminating business policies showing signs of violating the law on competition and consumer protection.