News Intel Accused of Anti-Competitive Practices in India

[Admin]

Intel allegedly gave its partnered resellers in India an unfair advantage over their competitors, leading to prices up to 2.5x higher than in other countries.

Intel Accused of Anti-Competitive Practices in India : Read more

 

[jeremyj_83]

Intel accused of Anti-Competitive Practices 😲....must be Wednesday.

 

[GetSmart]

Parallel importers are not happy about having being left out of the warranty loop and deal with better(higher) prices from authorized sellers.

 

[Groveling_Wyrm]

So the rough translation is...

There is a flood of fake products flooding into India. Intel is seeing them come into their service centers, as the fakes they are. So Intel looses money by having to replace these fake parts. Intel then tries to protect itself and stop this loophole by enacting this rule, so that they don't have to service these fake products, and someone gets butthurt.

Much ado about nothing...this shouldn't go anywhere....

 

[redgarl]

So the rough translation is...

There is a flood of fake products flooding into India. Intel is seeing them come into their service centers, as the fakes they are. So Intel looses money by having to replace these fake parts. Intel then tries to protect itself and stop this loophole by enacting this rule, so that they don't have to service these fake products, and someone gets butthurt.

Much ado about nothing...this shouldn't go anywhere....

No, you don't get it. People are forced to buy an Intel CPU at 2.6X times the prices of the MSRP because if they don't, they cannot get customer support and their warranty are invalid when dealing with the foreign dealer. For example, you are in India and order from Newegg Germany because the imports fees are less than the markup in your country, then if the product is defective, unless this happens in 30 days to return your product to Newegg Germany, you are stuck with no warranty in India... forcing people in India to incur additional markup costs just because of Intel decision.

There is obviously a deal with Intel and Indian suppliers and this is what the Indian authority is fighting over.

Good news is AMD Ryzen will solve this whole mess for Intel... they will lose massive market share.

 

[bloodroses]

No, you don't get it. People are forced to buy an Intel CPU at 2.6X times the prices of the MSRP because if they don't, they cannot get customer support and their warranty are invalid when dealing with the foreign dealer. For example, you are in India and order from Newegg Germany because the imports fees are less than the markup in your country, then if the product is defective, unless this happens in 30 days to return your product to Newegg Germany, you are stuck with no warranty in India... forcing people in India to incur additional markup costs just because of Intel decision.

There is obviously a deal with Intel and Indian suppliers and this is what the Indian authority is fighting over.

Good news is AMD Ryzen will solve this whole mess for Intel... they will lose massive market share.

But as the article states, That is not due to Intel since they set their prices at MSRP. If India goes after anyone, it should be the resellers that are ripping their customers off. They are really grasping at straws trying to say it's Intel's doing that the authorized resellers in India are crooks.

To put it a better way. You buy a Chevrolet from a dealership. Your oil change appointment comes do. You take your car in to have the oil done and they charge you $125 instead of the normal $50 -60 it'd cost at other oil change places (which may not be covered under warranty). Is it General Motors at fault for ripping you off, or the dealership? You could always do the oil change yourself for like $20-30, but that of course will end the warranty. You could always just skip the oil change all together, but we all know where that will eventually end....


As with AMD; good job, they finally just about caught up to Intel for performance and it's about time. They are a hot item right now for personal users and will be until Intel finally responds. In the business world though, it's still Intel dominated due to compatibility. If you really think AMD is going to dethrone or run Intel out of business, you obviously have never followed history in regards to the Athlon/FX years.

 

[TJ Hooker]

There is a flood of fake products flooding into India. Intel is seeing them come into their service centers, as the fakes they are. So Intel looses money by having to replace these fake parts.

Uh, why would Intel be honoring their warranty and replacing fake parts?

 

[TJ Hooker]

But as the article states, That is not due to Intel since they set their prices at MSRP. If India goes after anyone, it should be the resellers that are ripping their customers off. They are really grasping at straws trying to say it's Intel's doing that the authorized resellers in India are crooks.

Yeah, if there is anything unethical going on here my first guess would be price fixing/gouging among the authorized resellers. I guess you could maybe place some blame on Intel depending on what the requirements are for becoming an authorized reseller. E.g. if it is expensive/arduous to become one, or if Intel limits the number, that could reduce competition which could make it easier for those who do get authorized to collude/gouge.

 

[joeblowsmynose]

Uh, why would Intel be honoring their warranty and replacing fake parts?

Good question ... If the problem is created by shady retailers, and by Intel NOT honouring the warranty on fake parts and tells the consumer that the retailer sold him an illegal part, then the shade will get thrown back on the retailer, hurting their illegal business - a self correcting problem that would even save Intel a bit of money by not honouring a warranty on an illegal or fake product.

So the question is why is Intel choosing to lose money by honouring warranty on fake products, when they could just not do that and help correct the problem of shady retailers? Cui bono?

There seems to be something not quite logical about all this, and maybe that's why the complaint in the first place. On the surface it seems that there's nothing really wrong here, but I am not so sure ... this is Intel we are talking about after all.

 

[Groveling_Wyrm]

Uh, why would Intel be honoring their warranty and replacing fake parts?

Because Intel can't tell at first, when the get the malfunctioning parts, and replaces it, for a fast turn around, then come to find that they have received the bad/fake parts, when it is too late.

 

[bit_user]

Parallel importers are not happy about having being left out of the warranty loop and deal with better(higher) prices from authorized sellers.

I'm not sure if this is more a case about price-fixing or warranty coverage.

Restricting warranty coverage to authorized resellers doesn't seem that unusual. You see that with a lot of products - even in the US. But, if it's used to support an unjustifiable price differential, that seems like the real issue.

 

[bit_user]

Good news is AMD Ryzen will solve this whole mess for Intel... they will lose massive market share.

How do you know that the situation for AMD is any different? If resellers charge a certain markup, they probably don't make an exception for AMD.

And AMD might have a similar warranty policy, but haven't been litigated due to being a much smaller player. Unless you know differently, I wouldn't pose AMD as the solution to this problem.

 

[bit_user]

But as the article states, That is not due to Intel since they set their prices at MSRP. If India goes after anyone, it should be the resellers that are ripping their customers off. They are really grasping at straws trying to say it's Intel's doing that the authorized resellers in India are crooks.

To put it a better way. You buy a Chevrolet from a dealership.

I think a better analogy involving car dealerships would be if Chevy only authorized dealerships spaced at least 300 miles apart. This would prevent most people from being able to shop around, and therefore restrict competition between dealerships. That would allow them to raise prices, considerably.

So, the operative question is whether Intel's India reseller program has any component of limiting competition between resellers. If not, then it's strange that competitive forces have failed to drive down the price premium they're charging. That needs to be understood.

 

[bit_user]

Because Intel can't tell at first, when the get the malfunctioning parts, and replaces it, for a fast turn around, then come to find that they have received the bad/fake parts, when it is too late.

That makes no sense. Why should this be any different for India than anywhere else? Manufacturers always have to deal with people attempting warranty fraud (whether intentional or not). If you send in a part where the IHS has been resurfaced and re-printed with forged information, Intel can probably tell. In such cases, it is customary and expected that they would return the failed product to the customer, at their expense. The customer can then take up the issue with whoever sold them the counterfeit CPU.

I think it's not unreasonable for Intel to restrict support to authorized resellers, but I also think it should be feasible for them not to, so long as they're permitted to charge reasonable fees for covering the cost of handing potentially counterfeit processors.

 

[Groveling_Wyrm]

That makes no sense. Why should this be any different for India than anywhere else? Manufacturers always have to deal with people attempting warranty fraud (whether intentional or not). If you send in a part where the IHS has been resurfaced and re-printed with forged information, Intel can probably tell. In such cases, it is customary and expected that they would return the failed product to the customer, at their expense. The customer can then take up the issue with whoever sold them the counterfeit CPU.

I think it's not unreasonable for Intel to restrict support to authorized resellers, but I also think it should be feasible for them not to, so long as they're permitted to charge reasonable fees for covering the cost of handing potentially counterfeit processors.

You need to understand how they process any returns. First and foremost is customer experience. In keeping with that, they tend to get the customer a replacement part as fast as they can, in many cases, before they test the existing part. That is where the problem lies.

You also have to remember that laws in India ARE different than anywhere else. You can't just assume that they are the same. Every country is as different as you or me.