14 DAY TRIAL // Back in May this year, the EU Commission ended a long investigation into Intel's pricing policy, ruling that the Santa Clara, California-based chip maker was guilty and had to pay a record fine of US$1.45 billion. The decision against the world's leading chip maker also imposed Intel to cease any illegal rebates and other practices that were anticompetitive towards its main rival, AMD. On that note, the chip maker has just decided to appeal to the EU court over the antitrust fine, saying that the Commission misinterpreted some evidence, which led to the record-setting fine.
According to a recent news-article on Reuters, Intel, the world's leading vendor of computer processors, appealed on Wednesday to Europe's second highest court, Luxembourg-based Court of First Instance, against the aforementioned antitrust finding and a 1.06 billion Euro (approximately US$1.5 billion) fine. “We believe the European Commission misinterpreted some evidence and ignored other pieces of evidence,” Intel spokesman Robert Manetta said.
The penalty that was imposed on the chip maker back in May was the result of an investigation that had been going around since back in 2001, with Intel said to have used illegal practices to make its main rival AMD leave the market. The fine, which is said to represent 4.15 percent of the company's 2008 turnover, is the second highest fine imposed by the EU Commission to any enterprise. Following the decision, Intel immediately showed its disapproval and stated that it would appeal to the Court of First Instance.
According to the aforementioned article on Reuters, the Commission's ruling and finding could put some pressure on its overseas counterparts. In the U.S. the chip maker is currently under investigation by both the Federal Trade Commission and the New York attorney general's office, and it could soon be facing another antitrust trial.