EU missed vital evidence in Intel case

The European Commission has been accused of ignoring important evidence

European Union regulators missed vital evidence when they ruled against chip giant Intel in a recent antitrust case involving rival AMD, according to reports.

The Wall Street Journal yesterday reported that a European Union ombudsman, P. Nikiforos Diamandouros is set to deliver a report to the European Commission accusing it of ‘maladministration’.

According to Diamandouros, the Commission did not formally record an account of a meeting it had with a senior Dell executive, who rated the performance of AMD chips "very poor".

Such a testimony would imply that Dell chose Intel’s chips on merit rather than being bullied into doing so, as the Commission’s initial ruling found.

However, the new evidence is unlikely to change the outcome of the case, and there is no record of the discussion, so it is still unclear what the executive said, the report said.

The European Commission hit Intel with a record $1.45 billion fine earlier this year after it ruled that the firm had abused its market leading position by forcing vendors to buy Intel-based chips and not AMD ones.

The Intel case was fought with bad blood on both sides, with the chip giant at one stage going to an EU court to force the commission to add documents to the case file, a move the Commission alleged was a delaying tactic. Intel also accused the Commission of violating “human-rights protections meant to ensure a fair defence”, the WSJ said.