Intel says the $40 million in interest it received from the EC isn’t nearly enough and instead, it wants $625 million
In January, Intel won a court appeal involving a 1.06 billion-euro ($1.2 billion) antitrust fine, which it initially paid to the European Commission (EC) in 2009. The EC repaid this money in early 2022, including €38 million ($40 million) in interest. However, this week Intel submitted a filing claiming that wasn’t enough — not even close — and now, it’s coming for additional damages to the tune of of €593 million ($625 million).
The new sum, according to an application sent to the Luxembourg-based General Court, is based on the interest it would have accrued over the 13 years since it paid the fine and is the result of the European Central Bank refinancing its interest rate of 1.25% beginning May 2009, but then was increased to 3.5% from August 2009 to February this year when Intel was repaid.
If successful, the filing would result in the biggest damages amount since a court decision in 2021 allowed companies to claim interest on fines held by the EC for years.
Qualcomm also recently won an appeal against a €997 million fine imposed by the EC four years ago because the General Court of the EU faults in how the case was handled, citing “a number of procedural irregularities” that impacted Qualcomm’s rights of defense and “invalidate the Commission’s analysis of the conduct alleged against Qualcomm.”
When taken together, these two cases mark an interesting development in the European Union’s (EU) attempts to squash big tech companies seeking to hinder healthy market competition.
