The companies – We, Harel and Triple C – are charged with an offense of a party to a restrictive arrangement under Section 47(a)(1) of the Law as drafted at the relevant time, together with Sections 2(a), 2(b)(1), 2(b)(3), 4 and 55A(b) of the Competition Law, as well as the offense of fraudulent receipt under aggravated circumstances, in accordance with Section 415 of the Penal Law, and together with Section 23(a)(2) of the Penal Law. Oshri and Nahum are attributed the responsibility of officers by virtue of Section 48 of the Competition Law.
Discussion
Background
- In the framework of the Anemone Project, in fact, several projects that were so called, ELTA had provided in the past, a few years before the indictment in question, a system based on a certain technological solution for a foreign customer (Oshri, p. 4584, paras. 6-16, Vered, p. 6377, s. 22, this is a series of projects). Anemone was born out of the need to purchase several dozen old IBM computer servers, servers that at that time the manufacturer – IBM – had already ceased to manufacture, and which would be compatible with the solution and system previously provided in the framework of the Anemone Project (Oshri, p. 4584, paras. 17-24, these products were called end of life; Vered, p. 6407, s. 22). In other words, Balam Anemone's interest is not in the actual project – including involvement in the characterization or construction of a technological solution – but rather in locating old servers of a certain type in order to sell them to Elta, without any real "added value" that the suppliers have beyond that (Oshri, p. 4584, paras. 22-27).
- The main figures in the matter of the fifth indictment are: on the procurement side – Kinitorek, who, as stated above, served as a buyer and head of the buyers team at Elta at the relevant times (p. 312, paras. 2-23); on the project side – Moti Vered (Vered), an engineer, who in the years 2009-2010 was the head of the Anemone project in Elta in Ashdod (p. 6377, paras. 17-22, p. 6380, paras. 24-25). In connection with the Anemone Project, Mirel Rosenthal (Rosenthal), an electronics technician who worked for many years at Elta and the Anemone Project, that is, on behalf of the Elta project, testified, among others. At the time of his testimony, Rosenthal was a pensioner of ELTA (p. 6682, paras. 7-21, Rosenthal testified with the consent of the parties in a visual conference); Other sources on the ELTA procurement side also testified, including Shkedi, head of components procurement and computing at Elta, who was in charge of KinTurk; and Zaguri, head of the procurement administration at Elta, who was Shkedi's supervisor.
- At the outset, we will briefly refer to the events that preceded the publication of the Special Operations Unit. We will discuss the arguments raised by the defendants on these grounds.
- Locating servers in Alltrade -
Prior to the issuance of the IDF, the project staff at Elta conducted an inquiry regarding the possibility of locating suitable servers.