Photo/Illutration The Tokyo headquarters of advertising giant Dentsu Inc. (Tsubasa Setoguchi)

Prosecutors on Feb. 28 handed out a spate of indictments after the Fair Trade Commission issued criminal complaints earlier the same day against Japan’s two largest advertising agencies for rigging bids for Tokyo Olympic pre-events.

Along with the advertising giants Dentsu Inc. and Hakuhodo DY Holdings Inc., the Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office indicted four companies: a smaller ad firm called Tokyu Agency Inc., the event planning companies Cerespo Co. and Same Two Inc., and the TV production company Fuji Creative Corp.

The seven key individuals indicted include Yasuo Mori, 56, who served as deputy executive director of the Tokyo Olympic organizing committee’s operations bureau; Koji Henmi, 55, former assistant director of Dentsu’s sports division; Yoshiji Kamata, 59, a Cerespo managing director; and Masahiko Fujino, 63, a Fuji Creative Corp. executive.

According to the FTC, Mori and executives of six companies, including Dentsu, made a mockery of the competitive bidding process.

They did so by deciding between February and July 2018 which companies would be awarded bids for organizing Olympic test events, as well as the subsequent competitions during the Tokyo Olympics.

The contracts totaled 43.7 billion yen ($321 million).

Three of the nine companies awarded contracts are not covered in the criminal complaint.

The FTC granted leniency toward ADK Holdings Inc., the third largest adverting agency, because it was the first to inform the FTC about the wrongdoing.

It found that two other advertising agencies were not involved in the bid rigging.

The maximum penalty for companies found to have violated the Anti-Monopoly Law by restricting fair competition is 5 million yen, while individuals face maximum penalties of five years imprisonment or a 5-million-yen fine.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said at his Feb. 28 news conference that if the bid-rigging allegations are true, they damage the image of sports in Japan.

(Yuto Yoneda and Takashi Narazaki contributed to this article.)

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