Qualcomm Has Been Penalized With €1 billion for Anti-Competitive Apple Deal

Recent headlines were made by Qualcomm today. The company was slapped with a €997 million ($1.2 billion) fine by the EU in recent days. 

The lawsuit in opposition to Qualcomm has counterparts with the 2009 Intel litigation – a multinational compensates the CPU constructors to shut-out less significant opponents. The company is at present under inquiry by the EU for marketing chipsets for internet dongles at below-cost to hamper Icera, these days acquired by NVidia.

The reports say that the chipset company had paid Apple to brush-off competitors amid 2011 and 2016 respectively. Rendering to the European Court, “billions of dollars” were included in the pact for the 4G microchip in the iPhones and iPads by Qualcomm.

EU Competition Commissioner, Margrethe Vestager said that “The deal meant that “no rival could successfully defy Qualcomm in this market, no matter how worthy their merchandises were in front of the company”.

This deal and arrangement by Qualcomm and Apple mainly affected Intel more than anybody else. Intel is the one who supplies iDevices from the time when the unveiling of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus took place.

Margrethe also said that “The fine, which is equal to 4.9% of Qualcomm’s revenue, must aid as a notice to other tech corporations.” She also added that “Apple is in free as there is no indication of unlawful activity from the companies end.”

When we got hold of these details obviously it was surprising to us, but we know and understand how this monopoly works. Any thoughts, if this came as a surprise to you guys too?