News Intel receives $536 million from EU following antitrust fine reversal

[Admin]

The chipmaker received the amount as default interest from the European Commission following an appeal against a €1.06 billion ($1.1 billion) fine levied in 2009

Intel receives $536 million from EU following antitrust fine reversal : Read more

 

[derekullo]

Intel: They accused us of being this much anti-competitive

But we were really this much

 

[spongiemaster]

Intel: They accused us of being this much anti-competitive

But we were really this much

This case had nothing to do with whether Intel was guilty or not. This was about recouping interest on the fine Intel paid the EU that was later mostly reversed.

 

[watzupken]

This is a bad joke. How in the world can you fine a company based on evidence of wrongdoing, and then later reverse it? So what were used as proof of wrongdoing is a mistake? The court room nowadays are like a playground in my opinion.

 

[Co BIY]

$536 million is way more than a "moral victory"!

 

[AkroZ]

This is a bad joke. How in the world can you fine a company based on evidence of wrongdoing, and then later reverse it? So what were used as proof of wrongdoing is a mistake? The court room nowadays are like a playground in my opinion.

Because the fine was made by the European Commission and they presumes all rebates as unlawful.
The European Courts ask for evidences, in Europe all actions are lawful until proved otherwise.
Basically the Commission laked evidences for the fine, only a portion have evidences so the court confirmed the fine covered by the evidences and asked to reimburse the remaining.
The Commission only paid the nominal value to reimburse when previous cases (and the law) said they should reimburse with compound interests (Printeos caselaw 2014), this is not setting a precedent.

The Intel Saga started in 2000 by AMD and it's not the end, just the closure on the chapter "Intel II".

 

[das_stig]

Obviously, Intel had better lawyers or EU lawyers are like its politicians and employees, bloody useless at the job and it in for the money and freebies. Waiting for the EU accountants to come knocking on Starmers door and ask for a handout, after all we were members when the fine was issued on our behalf or we don't get to talk anymore about the future sell out!

 

[Pierce2623]

This is a bad joke. How in the world can you fine a company based on evidence of wrongdoing, and then later reverse it? So what were used as proof of wrongdoing is a mistake? The court room nowadays are like a playground in my opinion.

It just goes to show you, even when you’re clearly guilty and already convicted, if you’re rich enough, you can still get out of it.

 

[GenericUser2001]

This is a bad joke. How in the world can you fine a company based on evidence of wrongdoing, and then later reverse it? So what were used as proof of wrongdoing is a mistake? The court room nowadays are like a playground in my opinion.

Not to comment on this specific cases, but appealing legal decisions to a higher court is really common. Occasionally those appeals do succeed, as the higher court may find that the evidence of wrongdoing itself was false, or was illegally collected, or new stronger evidence may appear that overrides the earlier evidence, and so on. Courts are not infallible, that is the entire reason there is an appeal process in the first place.

 

[Pierce2623]

Not to comment on this specific cases, but appealing legal decisions to a higher court is really common. Occasionally those appeals do succeed, as the higher court may find that the evidence of wrongdoing itself was false, or was illegally collected, or new stronger evidence may appear that overrides the earlier evidence, and so on. Courts are not infallible, that is the entire reason there is an appeal process in the first place.

You know what else is common? Huge companies lobbying and greasing palms to get out of fines by pushing it to a higher court.