Last May, the European Commission fined Intel a record €1.06 billion for abuse of dominant position and illegal anti-competitive practices. The European Ombudsman, Nikiforos Diamandouros, has recently published his decision on a complaint by Intel alleging procedural errors by the Commission during its anti-trust investigation.
Intel argued that the Commission's DG Competition had failed to take minutes of a meeting with a senior executive from computer manufacturer Dell, albeit the meeting directly concerned the subject-matter of the Commission's anti-trust investigation of Intel. Nikiforos Diamandouros noted that the Commission’s investigation file did not include the agenda of the meeting and found that the Commission's DG Competition had failed to make a proper note of that meeting. The European Ombudsman concluded, therefore, that the Commission committed maladministration.
Moreover, Intel alleged that the Commission encouraged Dell to sign an information exchange agreement with AMD the micro-chip producer and Intel competitor which, according to it, gave AMD access to confidential information contained in the Commission's investigation file. The European Ombudsman did not find maladministration as regards this allegation, nevertheless he criticised the Commission for having failed to make notes of the content of a telephone call between senior representatives of Dell and senior Commission representatives, in which the information exchange agreement was first discussed. He said that “Such a note would have helped to clarify the relevant facts.” He recommended, therefore, the Commission to “improve its administrative procedures by ensuring that its future anti-trust investigations are fully documented."
According to Eurobusiness Intel said that "The Ombudsman's decision speaks for itself. Intel has consistently said that the (EU) directorate general of competition ignored evidence that was potentially exculpatory for Intel and that it was selective in its use of other evidence.”
