EU reimposes $400 mn fine on Intel for blocking sales of competing chips

LONDON: The European Commission on Friday re-imposed a $400 million fine on chip giant Intel for abusing its dominant position in the market for its computer chips called x86 central processing units (CPUs).

In 2009, the Commission had slapped Intel with a record-breaking $1.13 billion penalty after it had determined that Intel abused its dominant position in the market.

In 2014, the General Court dismissed Intel’s appeal against the 2009 Commission’s decision. In 2022, the General Court ruled again on the matter and annulled the part of the 2009 Commission’s decision concerning the conditional rebates, but confirmed the unlawfulness of Intel’s “naked restrictions”.

Now, EU reinstated $400 million fine on Intel for blocking sales of competing chips -- less than half of the $1.13 billion fine the Commission originally levied against Intel.

The Commission found that Intel had abused its dominant position by “giving wholly or partially hidden rebates to computer manufacturers on condition that they bought all, or almost all, their x86 CPUs from Intel”.

It also found that Intel paid “computer manufacturers to halt or delay the launch of specific products containing competitors’ x86 CPUs and to limit the sales channels available to these products (so-called ‘naked restrictions’)”.

In its 2022 judgment, the General Court confirmed the unlawfulness of Intel’s naked restrictions. “With today’s decision, the Commission has re-imposed a fine on Intel only for its naked restrictions practice. The fine does not relate to Intel’s conditional rebates practice,” it said.