Intel must pay in 2009 antitrust case Reuters reported Wednesday. The company lost its legal battle against a 376 million euro ($438.7 million) fine imposed by the European Commission. However, Intel managed to reduce the amount to 237 million euros ($276.6 million).
The business started in 2009, when mobile computing was still in its infancy and netbooks (remember those?) were all the rage in the PC world. At the time, the EU determined that Intel had violated antitrust laws on several fronts. First, the company used illegal hidden rebates to drive competitors out of the PC processor market. Second, manufacturers were paid to delay or stop production of AMD-based products.
The latter, the part to which today’s penalty applies, was described as a “naked legal restriction”. These were anti-competitive payments Intel made to HP, Acer and Lenovo between 2002 and 2006.
As is often the case in such situations, the legal process fluctuated between courts for years. In 2017, the European Supreme Court ordered a review of the case, citing the lack of proper economic assessment of the effect of Intel’s behavior on its competitors. Europe’s second-highest court subsequently overturned the decision on the first part (disguised leniency) of the fine in 2022, a decision upheld by the European Court of Justice last year. The fine, originally set at 1.06 billion euros ($1.2 billion), was removed from the accounts.
The second fine (“bare restrictions”) was imposed in 2023 after European courts upheld this part. Intel’s latest challenge was also to eliminate this. Instead, you have to settle for a discount of one third of the original amount.
With today’s decision, there is a temptation to declare the case closed. However, the Commission and Intel can still appeal the decision to the European Court of Justice. Come back next year to see if this long and strange saga has another chapter.