Chipmaker Intel faces fine of up to €1bn if found guilty of trying to alienate competition

THE country’s largest microchip maker, Intel is facing massive fines of up to €1 billion for allegedly trying to put its competitors out of business.

Intel Ireland employs over 5,500 people directly and indirectly at Leixlip, which is its largest manufacturing plant outside the US, and has over 80% of the world market for CPU computer chips.

The European Commission has said that Intel was trying to unfairly kill off competition from AMD (Advanced Micro Devices) by offering rebates in exchange for using Intel-only products, by selling at below-cost to strategic customers such as governments when bidding against AMD, and making payments to delay or cancel products using AMD chips.