By Stevie Smith Jan 8, 2008, 14:00 GMT
Following antitrust charges levelled at it by the European Commission in the summer of last year, leading chipmaker Intel Corporation has this week said it has issued its confidential response and will be seeking an official hearing on the matter.
Chipmaker Intel seeks a hearing in European Commission antitrust case. Credit: Intel.
Confirmation of the requested hearing was revealed yesterday by an official spokesman for California-based Intel Corp., which was first charged with illegally attempting to drive rival chipmaker AMD out of business back in July of 2007.
The European Commission filed its charges on grounds that Intel was purposely slashing product prices and offering sizeable rebates in order to unfairly remove competition from the technology marketplace.
By way of response, Intel maintains that it has always operated within legal boundaries and is now exercising its right to have the case placed before a hearing officer, who will then report his/her findings back to Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes.
Should Intel be granted a hearing, it is believed that complexities related to its case will not see it undertaken before perhaps mid-April, reports the Reuters news agency.
If Intel’s eventual hearing fails to sway the charges brought forth by the European Commission, the industry-leading chipmaker could be facing a competition abuse fine reaching as high as 10 percent of the company’s global annual revenue.
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