Computer cartel

Ten computer chip manufacturers will pay fines totaling 331 million euros ($409 million) as part of a European Union legal settlement for conspiring to fix the prices of memory chips.

The European Commission said the companies coordinated prices and quotes for Dynamic Random Access Memory, or DRAM, chips sold to European computer makers from July 1998 to June 2002. DRAM chips are used to store data in personal computers and video games.

The Commission alleged that the firms, including Germany's Infineon as well as Micron, Hynix, Samsung, Elpida, Hitachi, NEC, Nanya, Mitsubishi and Toshiba, had formed a cartel and formally charged them in early 2009. US-based Micron had confessed to the practice first, triggering the investigation and winning immunity from prosecution for themselves. Six of the companies that had cooperated with the investigation were rewarded with a 10 percent reduction in their fines.

Samsung paid the largest fine, 145.7 million euros. The other fines ranged from 1.8 million to 56 million euros.

This is the first time the Commission has used an out-of-court settlement to deal with a cartel.

"By acknowledging their participation in a cartel, the companies have allowed the commission to bring this long-running investigation to a close," said EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia in a statement. "The next settlement cases will take... no more than six months, in some cases less. This will allow us to concentrate our resources on more cartel cases in the future."

svs/AFP/dpa
Editor: Martin Kuebler