European Union antitrust regulators have raided Intel"s Munich office in Germany seeking evidence they may have broken rules to ensure competition in the market for computer chips. Additional raids were carried out against Britian"s DSG group, which owns Dixons, Currys, PC City and PC World.
The surprise inspections were the EU"s first major move in response to complaints from smaller rival Advanced Micro Devices Inc., alleging that Intel pressed major stores to avoid computers using AMD chips. Intel has said the company would cooperate closely with the investigation.
Intel is already facing formal EU charges of monopoly abuse for below-cost customer rebates and pricing that the EU says undercut AMD and discourage manufacturers from building computers with their chips.