|
|
New York files antitrust suit against Intel
Author: Gareth HalfacreePublished: 5th November 2009
New York AG Andrew M. Cuomo has filed a federal suit against Intel, alleging anti-competitive activities.
As reported over on CNet, Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo states in the suit that "Intel has engaged in a systematic worldwide campaign of illegal, exclusionary conduct to maintain its monopoly power and prices in the market for x86 microprocessors."
The suit, which looks to "bar further anti-competitive acts by Intel, restore lost competition, recover monetary damages suffered by New York governmental entities and consumers, and collect penalties," further claims that "by exacting exclusive or near-exclusive agreements from large computer makers in exchange for payments totalling billions of dollars, and threatening retaliation against any company that did not heed its wishes, Intel robbed its competitors of the opportunity to challenge Intel's dominance in key segments of the market."
The federal antitrust suit comes after a prolonged Federal Trade Commission investigation into allegedly anti-competitive activities carried out by Intel, largely centered around denying its rival AMD an even playing ground in which to compete.
Intel's Chuck Mulloy disagrees with Cuomo's claims - naturally - stating that "neither consumers - who have consistently benefited from lower prices and increased innovation - nor justice are being served by the decision to file this case now," instead of back when AMD first raised a complaint about Intel's activities over four years ago.
With the European Union already having found Intel guilty of the offences alleged by this latest suit - and having fined the company a whopping £948 million - Intel could be in for a tough financial year if it doesn't manage to argue its case in front of a federal court.
Do you believe that Intel needs to be brought to task for its actions against its competitors, or is AMD simply trying to litigate where it can't innovate? Share your thoughts over in the forums.
Related
Comments (16)- Site Links:
- About
- Email Editor
- Newsletter
- Privacy
- RSS
- Score Guide
- Our Other Websites:
- Auto Express
- Channel Pro
- Computer Buyer
- Computer Shopper
- Den of Geek
All content © bit-tech.net 2000-2010
© Copyright Dennis Publishing Limited licensed by Felden
There should be at least 10 Win compatible OSes out there and at least 4 or 5 companies making x86 chips.
We are in a mini Dark Age with regards to the PC platform and operating Systems.
Yours in more options Plasma,
Star*Dagger
But, if its true, then yes, I think Intel should be punished.
It would benefit enthusiasts if there were more OS' and more chip makers, but for the general public who don't know the difference between Intel and AMD, it would make choosing a computer even more difficult, especially with the quality of staff in most places like PC World, Dixons and Currys etc.
But its still not right, when theres only two options, it should not be allowed that option 1 can use its massive profits to try and exterminate option 2. Whatever the product is.
Intel might see this as a cheap price for long term dominance. Money and power are in the patents not the end product.
I kinda doubt that, it would be hard to start up a CPU manufacturing plant just like that and have people buy them. Most people I talk to don't even know what AMD is
mind boggling. you think the EU taking 1trillion from Intel is going to help the market? is the EU going to invest that money into chip design? and you think that the 2 companies who have lead the way the most in development and innovation would benefit the PC if they died? really? i suppose mac and Linux are just going to build working and fully integrated business systems overnight? or suddenly support all the standards used by gaming companies to help simplify their development and keep costs down?
as to Intel buying off dell, so what? Intel and dell are making a business choice, Intel is spending money to maintain exclusive ties to dell. dell weighs the costs and decides it likes the money more than providing its consumers more choice. in doing so it looses all customers who wanted to buy AMD, and a few customers who just don't like that kind of deal. fair enough.
there are a couple of ways amd can handle this:
1. leverage its higher profit margins per chip and run some advertising,
2. sign its own exclusive deal with someone else,
3. drop the price on its chips and make dell sorry they signed the contract buy giving dells competitors cheaper chips
and probably a few others i have not though of.
all of the above still benefits the consumer. #1 increases consumer awareness and #2 and #3 both bring the consumer cheaper goods.
if you say that amd was not capable of doing this because of X then my question to you is why was Intel capable of doing it? how did Intel overcome X? were they smarter? more innovative? did they leverage their assets better? if your answer is just "their bigger" i still want you to tell me how they got bigger. it probably leads back to one of the above. now tell me why we should punish the more successful company just because they are more successful.
again, their is nothing illegal with what Intel did. as a matter of apple does it all the time. tell me again why everyone is not suing apple?
mind boggling. you think the EU taking 1trillion from Intel is going to help the market? is the EU going to invest that money into chip design? and you think that the 2 companies who have lead the way the most in development and innovation would benefit the PC if they died? really? i suppose mac and Linux are just going to build working and fully integrated business systems overnight? or suddenly support all the standards used by gaming companies to help simplify their development and keep costs down?
as to Intel buying off dell, so what? Intel and dell are making a business choice, Intel is spending money to maintain exclusive ties to dell. dell weighs the costs and decides it likes the money more than providing its consumers more choice. in doing so it looses all customers who wanted to buy AMD, and a few customers who just don't like that kind of deal. fair enough.
there are a couple of ways amd can handle this:
1. leverage its higher profit margins per chip and run some advertising,
2. sign its own exclusive deal with someone else,
3. drop the price on its chips and make dell sorry they signed the contract buy giving dells competitors cheaper chips
and probably a few others i have not though of.
all of the above still benefits the consumer. #1 increases consumer awareness and #2 and #3 both bring the consumer cheaper goods.
if you say that amd was not capable of doing this because of X then my question to you is why was Intel capable of doing it? how did Intel overcome X? were they smarter? more innovative? did they leverage their assets better? if your answer is just "their bigger" i still want you to tell me how they got bigger. it probably leads back to one of the above. now tell me why we should punish the more successful company just because they are more successful.
again, their is nothing illegal with what Intel did. as a matter of apple does it all the time. tell me again why everyone is not suing apple?
in short it is not a monoply if there are other viable options. they did get to be dominant because they made better products, all things considered, in the eyes of most people and buisnesses. again, why should they be punished for this? and why should there be different rules for appple just because they are smaller?
also, you did not adress any of my other points. they are relevant to the converstaion.
most basic ecconomic books will tell you not to punish the sucessful, because it will give them less incentive to keep on being sucessful.
Uhh everything you described violates anti-trust laws in the US. The market Dell was pissed off about wasn't loonies like you, you're pennies on billions. It was the server business. During that time frame AMD was a cash cow, if you could sell it... Michael Dell had to come back to run the company because it was doing poorly. In business if you hold the majority of a market, say >50% you're going to have a lot of eyes on your practices. Historically companies that have had that much control over a market tried to eliminate all competition. Don't know why but that seems to be the trend. You can be successful when you follow the rules.
Also, there is no link to this thread in the article.
Busted.
Most people don't know what part of a computer Intel makes either.
Most had no idea who Cyrix was or AMD, yet people still do and did buy them. People buy a computer, if it works, and it's cheap they will buy it (if it has Windows). The x86 license for Cyrix is still out there, and can be purchased (VIA controls it at the moment), everyone assumed Nvidia was going to make a bid for it and produce an x86 chip.
As for starting a chip company, the x86 license is the biggest holdout (which is arguably anti-competetive in itself as Nvidia recently found). Manufacturing is not an issue nearly as much as you think. IBM, Nvidia, and several others (Motorola?) all have the fabrication abilities.