Intel's 1 Billion Euro fine appeal rejected - Now it's time to pay.

[WYP]

In 2009 European Judges determine that between 2002 and 2007 Intel had intentionally blocked their Rival AMD, allowing them to dominate the market and AMD to face decline.

Now, after Intel's appeal against the collossal 1.06 Billion Euro Fine for anti-competitive practices has been rejected, it looks like Intel will have to pay up.

So what Exactly did Intel do? Well in those years Intel offered large rebates to manufacturers, such as Dell, HP and Lenovo , so that these companies would favour Intel chips to AMDs offerings. Also the EU competition authority found that Intel has paid the German retail chain Media Saturn Holding to stock only Intel based systems, again hurting AMD sales.

The Courts and Judges said;

The Commission demonstrated to the requisite legal standard that Intel attempted to conceal the anti-competitive nature of its practices and implemented a long term comprehensive strategy to foreclose AMD from the strategically most important sales channels.

The General Court considers that none of the arguments raised by Intel supports the conclusion that the fine imposed is disproportionate. On the contrary, it must be considered that that fine is appropriate in the light of the facts of the case

AMD's current performance compared to Intel has undoubtedly been affected by these measures over time, making their profits and R&D budgets lower drastically. This can be said is what made the Intel and AMD performance gap to become so wide.

Intel said that they were "dissapointed with the descision" and that "This is a complex case and the decision reflects that. We have begun the process of evaluating the court's judgment."

Depending on Intel's evaluation they can either pay up or appeal to the European Court of Justice, but here they can only appeal on points of law.

In this writers opinion Intel need to take responsibility for their previous actions and pay up, that being said I doubt Intel will pay up if there is any chance of getting the decision appealed.

Source - BBC

 

[barnsley]

Who is surprised? Both companies always have it out for eachother.

 

[SeekaX]

Eh, what's a billion Euros compared to the winnings they made of AMDs decline. I doubt history would've been too different without their overly competitive marketing. Stupid mistake.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Ya heard about this earlier.. its equal to $1.5 billion in the US currency. So Intel will end up paying this money to AMD right? Didn't find that anywhere.

 

[barnsley]

Ya heard about this earlier.. its equal to $1.5 billion in the US currency. So Intel will end up paying this money to AMD right? Didn't find that anywhere.

If it goes to AMD thats basically a year and halfs worth of profit for them.

 

[SieB]

Now we know the real reason for the Haswell refresh :lol:
They need to rake in the money they are about to pay out.

 

[cooperman]

Now we know the real reason for the Haswell refresh :lol:
They need to rake in the money they are about to pay out.

 

[SeekaX]

Now we know the real reason for the Haswell refresh :lol:
They need to rake in the money they are about to pay out.

I highly doubt the haswell refresh is going to generate $1.5b.
It's not like they didn't make far more profit than that anyways in the past 10 years.

 

[SieB]

I highly doubt the haswell refresh is going to generate $1.5m.
It's not like they didn't make far more profit than that anyways in the past 10 years.

I was joking dude but yeah Intel can afford to pay it either way.
Hopefully we will get some good competitive AMD CPUs as a result of this though.

 

[Zoot]

Eh, what's a billion Euros compared to the winnings they made of AMDs decline. I doubt history would've been too different without their overly competitive marketing. Stupid mistake.

Chump change.

What's annoying about Intel and their anti-competitive tactics is that they really wouldn't survive in a free market scenario at all. If you want an example just look at how badly they're doing in the mobile world. The same is true of a lot of mega corporations too.

 

[SeekaX]

I was joking dude but yeah Intel can afford to pay it either way.
Hopefully we will get some good competitive AMD CPUs as a result of this though.

I know, just saying.
I don't think 1.5b will be enough to catch up to intel. Wouldn't be the right place to invest for AMD, they will probably put it in the mobile/APU market where the real money is.

Chump change.

What's annoying about Intel and their anti-competitive tactics is that they really wouldn't survive in a free market scenario at all. If you want an example just look at how badly they're doing in the mobile world. The same is true of a lot of mega corporations too.

Intel missed the shot in the mobile race iirc, not sure if that is a good example. Business is no fairy tale, dirty marketing is one of the trades every large company calls their own (well, not publicly). It just so happens that Intel got caught doing it. Doesn't make it any fairer, but nice guys finish last.
Also the mobile market is definitely no free market scenario. Look at all the bitch fights happening between various manufacturers.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Intel missed the shot in the mobile race iirc, not sure if that is a good example. Business is no fairy tale, dirty marketing is one of the trades every large company calls their own (well, not publicly). It just so happens that Intel got caught doing it. Doesn't make it any fairer, but nice guys finish last.
Also the mobile market is definitely no free market scenario. Look at all the bitch fights happening between various manufacturers.

Got to agree on the mobile markets. Hell Intel is barely into it and they are nearly surpassing all the others when it comes to processing power. Sure now they aren't that close but they are making huge gains quickly. Give it a few years. It will change and AMD will also be a much bigger player as they are making massive gains as well.

 

[Zoot]

Got to agree on the mobile markets. Hell Intel is barely into it and they are nearly surpassing all the others when it comes to processing power. Sure now they aren't that close but they are making huge gains quickly. Give it a few years. It will change and AMD will also be a much bigger player as they are making massive gains as well.

This is off-topic but, I wouldn't be so sure about that last part. Intel's problem in the mobile world is that nobody really wants x86 in mobile. Intels mobile stuff might be very good, but it's still x86 and the mobile world has been built up around ARM.

I wouldn't bank on huge gains for AMD either for the same reason. I don't think AMD wants any of that market either, and they're better off to stay out of it. Competing with the likes of Qualcomm in their back-garden for AMD would make competing with Intel look easy.

 

[RamboOC]

This is off-topic but, I wouldn't be so sure about that last part. Intel's problem in the mobile world is that nobody really wants x86 in mobile. Intels mobile stuff might be very good, but it's still x86 and the mobile world has been built up around ARM.

I wouldn't bank on huge gains for AMD either for the same reason. I don't think AMD wants any of that market either, and they're better off to stay out of it. Competing with the likes of Qualcomm in their back-garden for AMD would make competing with Intel look easy.

x86 is the way to go. why arm? smart phones are now reaching performance levels of low-mid end desktops. also mass production x86 smart phones would mean that rom developers would port more operating systems

 

[barnsley]

x86 is the way to go. why arm? smart phones are now reaching performance levels of low-mid end desktops. also mass production x86 smart phones would mean that rom developers would port more operating systems

X86 is waaay more expensive than ARM. ARM stuff is also alot less power hungry as a whole. People like google and facebook are actually experimenting with using them as an alternative to your average server cpu. The way they do it is by using multiple cpus as a cluster. You basically get the same performance at a lower cost (both in purchasing and power usage). x86 will die out in my opinion.