From PC World: Intel's hope of recovering a record antitrust fine have improved with a recommendation from a top European Union judge on Thursday that the case be reviewed.
The company paid the €1.06 billion (then US$1.4 billion) fine in 2009 after the European Commission found it guilty of abusing its dominant position in the market for x86 processors. Since then, it has been seeking to have the judgment overturned, first by the EU's General Court and then, since 2014, by the EU's highest legal authority, the Court of Justice.
The CJEU heard that appeal in June, and now Advocate General Nils Wahl has issued his recommendation to the court. The opinions of the court's advocates general are not binding, but it often follows them.
Wahl recommended Thursday that the case be referred back to the General Court for review. He disagreed with the lower court's findings on a number of points of law raised by Intel.
Those points concerned the Commission's treatment of rebates Intel paid to four computer manufacturers, Dell, Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard and NEC on condition that they purchased almost all of their x86 CPUs from it, and payments it made to electronics retailer Media-Saturn on condition it sold only computers containing Intel’s x86 CPUs. The rebates and payments, the Commission said, made it harder for Intel’s competitors to compete on the merits of their x86 CPUs, reducing consumer choice and lowering the incentive to innovate.
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