Intel (partially) wins appeal on EU anti-trust case

[Carclis]

Doesn't this fall under misuse of market power or predatory pricing?

[mr moose]

1 hour ago, Carclis said:

Doesn't this fall under misuse of market power or predatory pricing?

yes, that's what anti-trust is.    But they still have to quantify the damage and prove it was directly/intrinsically related.

[Carclis]

2 hours ago, mr moose said:

yes, that's what anti-trust is.    But they still have to quantify the damage and prove it was directly/intrinsically related.

Well quantifying the damage is the only thing that really needs to be done. Money isn't just being given away for nothing. Of course the rebates are incentive to not use the competitions products...

[AnonymousGuy]

8 hours ago, Carclis said:

Doesn't this fall under misuse of market power or predatory pricing?

^{It's debatable based on your sensitivity level.  I'm in the camp that doesn't think Intel really did anything that isn't fair play in business when you're trying to win, the EU disagrees.}

[Kobathor]

7 minutes ago, AnonymousGuy said:

^{It's debatable based on your sensitivity level.  I'm in the camp that doesn't think Intel really did anything that isn't fair play in business when you're trying to win, the EU disagrees.}

Intel spy?

[Jito463]

9 hours ago, AnonymousGuy said:

^{It's debatable based on your sensitivity level.  I'm in the camp that doesn't think Intel really did anything that isn't fair play in business when you're trying to win, the EU disagrees.}

When you can literally lose the complete worth of your only competitor without breaking a sweat, it's absolutely unfair to bribe OEMs not to sell your competitors product (I'd argue that's never a good thing, but especially so when you have the dominant market position).

[Carclis]

10 hours ago, AnonymousGuy said:

^{It's debatable based on your sensitivity level.  I'm in the camp that doesn't think Intel really did anything that isn't fair play in business when you're trying to win, the EU disagrees.}

I'd be more inclined to agree if the actions of Intel were to actually sell their CPU's for a lower MSRP. The case states that they are bribing manufacturers to exclude the competition.
 

Quote

The case being considered on Wednesday centered on claims that Intel had abused its dominant position in the microchip market. The European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, found in 2009 that the company had offered rebates and incentives to computer makers to favor its products over those of a rival, Advanced Micro Devices.

The distinction here is that they're not making their product more compelling as a purchasing decision but making it impossible to choose anything else.

[mr moose]

15 hours ago, Carclis said:

Well quantifying the damage is the only thing that really needs to be done. Money isn't just being given away for nothing. Of course the rebates are incentive to not use the competitions products...

I believe the rebates went beyond incentive and were actually only valid if OEM didn't use competing chips at all. 

[Fetzie]

2 hours ago, mr moose said:

I believe the rebates went beyond incentive and were actually only valid if OEM didn't use competing chips at all. 

The rebates were only granted if less than 5% of devices sold used "competitor's" products.

[mr moose]

3 hours ago, Fetzie said:

The rebates were only granted if less than 5% of devices sold used "competitor's" products.

I wonder who at Intel decided on 5%.  And whether or not they assured their boss that 5% would some how be enough to make the deal legal.  

[Jupsik]

17 hours ago, AnonymousGuy said:

^{It's debatable based on your sensitivity level.  I'm in the camp that doesn't think Intel really did anything that isn't fair play in business when you're trying to win, the EU disagrees.}

The aim of competition law is to, in essence, keep capitalism in check. In the EU, this means ensuring that if a new company wants to come on the market with a better product, it can do so. However, if intel was left unchecked, any company trying to come on the cpu market would simply go bankrupt, since no system builder would be allowed to use the products of the competitor. 

First time this happens, intel loses some money to the rebates. At the same time it sends a message that if you want to come and compete with intel, be prepared to suffer a loss until Intel runs out of money. the result is that it is no longer plausible for most companies to enter the market, since entering it would mean suffering a loss, even if their product could potentially be better. This in turn means that intel would no longer lose market share and consequently, no longer has to invest money into RnD since it has no competitors. It can simply price its products higher without providing anything new to the consumer. 

[Eaglerino]

Is EU going to anti-trust every big company that goes there to try to get billions of Euros out of them?

[MMKing]

4 hours ago, Eaglerino said:

Is EU going to anti-trust every big company that goes there to try to get billions of Euros out of them?

I'm not sure what you're getting at. The FTC sued Intel in December 2009.

[MMKing]

On 9/7/2017 at 8:17 PM, AnonymousGuy said:

^{It's debatable based on your sensitivity level.  I'm in the camp that doesn't think Intel really did anything that isn't fair play in business when you're trying to win, the EU disagrees.}

Even Intel disagrees with you.

 

Japan fair trade commission - Cease and desist order to Intel

Korea - 25.4 million USD fine

USA - FTC sues Intel. Intel settles, has to modify rebate practices and establish 10 million USD fund for mislead customers.

USA - Attorney general of New York files antitrust lawsuit. Attorney general successor and Intel settle for 6.5 million USD.

AMD - Intel agree to settle all legal disputes for the sum of 1 billion, 250 million USD

 

Not only are Intel willingly paying laughably low fines in settlements. They paid over a billion dollars to settle with AMD, while allegedly being innocent. Intel is little more than the bastard of the tech industry, always holding off fines until their crime pays off enough to actually pay it. This is not even the first time Intel has screwed over AMD.

 

If anything, the 1.3 billion Euro fine is not high enough.