EU Charges Intel With Monopoly Abuse

EU regulators said Friday they have charged Intel with monopoly abuse for blocking rival chipmaker AMD's access to customers.
It said Intel gave 'substantial rebates' to computer makers for buying most of their computer processing units, or CPIs, from Intel; that it made payments to manufacturers to get them to delay or cancel product lines using AMD CPUs; and that it sold CPUs below cost to certain server customers to try to muscle into that business.
'These three types of conduct are aimed at excluding AMD, Intel's main rival, from the market,' the European Commission said. 'The three types of conduct reinforce each other and are part of a single overall anticompetitive strategy.'
Intel has 10 weeks to reply to the preliminary charges and can seek an oral hearing to defend itself, after which regulators may make a decision that would force the company to change its behavior under threat of fines.