US-based employees of a unit of engineer ABB bribed officials in Latin America and the Middle East with about $560,000 to win contracts, the group said today.
The suspect payments were discovered during an internal investigation after the dismissal of two managers at Texas-based ABB network management, a software subsidiary that employs around 150 people, ABB said.
ABB spokesman
"According to our findings these were bribery attempts to receive projects," an ABB spokesman said. "We believe that the matter involved only a few people," he added.
The disclosure made little impact on ABB's Swiss-listed shares, which were 0.6 per cent higher at 7.37 Swiss francs this morning, only slightly lagging the broader Swiss market.
ABB said in a statement it had made a voluntary disclosure about the case to the US Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and that it was fully co-operating with the two authorities.
Last year, the Swiss-based maker of electric motors and power technology sacked the manager of an Italian medium-voltage unit for what it called improper payments.
In another bribery case last year, two affiliates of ABB pleaded guilty in the United States to criminal charges of bribing African and Asian government officials to secure contracts between 1998 and 2003.
The company had to pay $10.5 million in fines and $5.9 million to disgorge illegal profits to settle the criminal charges and a separate SEC complaint in that case.