Intel Corporation (INTC) Displeased with Antitrust Regulators’ Decision

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) has been fined €1.06 bln ($1.4 bln) for breaching the antitrust law in 2009. The world’s biggest chip-maker requested EU’s top court to review the decision against its bid to eradicate the fine, Bloomberg reported on Thursday.

The company had been accused of giving rebates in part or in full to the computer manufacturers if they would have bought all, or almost all, their x86 central processing units (CPUs). Also, Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) is said to have been making payments to computer manufacturers in order to hinder the release of products containing competitors’ x86 CPUs and to limit the channels through which those products were supposed to be commercialized. The company to suffer most from these illicit activities was Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NYSE:AMD).

Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC) claims that legal errors were present in the decision making process regarding the case. There is no evidence upon a formally registered filing from the chip-maker colossus. However, their struggle to throw out the financial burden imposed will be a notably difficult one, because EU antitrust regulators have a two decade history of solely won cases at Luxembourg-based courts.

The decision regarding Intel Corporation (NASDAQ:INTC)’s fine was based on the scale of the market involved (Global) and on a pattern of consistent Court jurisprudence cases, among which: Case 85/76 Hoffmann-La Roche v Commission, Case T-203/01 Michelin v Commission, Case C-95/04British Airways v Commission, Joined Cases T-24/93 and others, Compagnie Maritime Belge v Commission and Case T-228/97, Irish Sugar.

The details upon the first decision regarding the case can be found in European Commission – MEMO/14/416   12/06/2014 on their website and what can be directly observed is that the General Court has fully confirmed the Commission’s findings, including the evidence and the amount of the fine. One way or the other, a consensus must be reached and if the wrongdoings are further confirmed, the punishment must be accepted with diligence for the common good.

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