European Commission investigating whether Qualcomm pushed competitors out of the market

The European Commission has launched two competition investigations into the American chip designer Qualcomm. The EU wants to know whether the company has forced exclusive purchases of its chipsets with discounts and whether it hindered competition with prices below cost.

The European Commission wants to examine Qualcomm’s pricing policy regarding 3G chipsets. The investigation must show whether the chip company has offered the chipsets below cost in order to push competitors from the market. The former Nvidia subsidiary Icera is said to have already complained about this to the European Commission in 2010.

The second study concerns 3G and 4G chipsets. The committee wants to find out whether Qualcomm has offered customers a financial advantage in exchange for exclusive, or almost exclusive, purchase of the chipsets. The EU also wants to know to what extent this behavior has hindered competitors from competing with Qualcomm. Qualcomm may have broken European antitrust law with the course of action.

The European Commission cannot yet say how long the investigation will take, as that depends, among other things, on the complexity of the case and the cooperation of the parties. If Qualcomm is found guilty, the chip company faces a multimillion-dollar fine. Last year, the Chinese government came to the conclusion that Qualcomm owns a monopoly, which resulted in a multi-million dollar fine for the group.