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Samsung To Pay Out $300 Million In Anti-Trust Suit

Posted by Zonk on from the that's-a-lot-of-ram dept.

infernalC writes "Reuters is reporting that Samsung has agreed to plea guilty to charges of price fixing in the memory market in a $300 million settlement." From the article: " Samsung would become the third chip maker to plead guilty in the wide-ranging probe of the prices of dynamic random access memory, or DRAM, chips. The Justice Department has blamed the price-fixing conspiracy for driving up the price of chips used in products ranging from personal computers and servers to cell phones, cameras and game consoles."

3 of 227 comments (clear)

  1. Fines and Penalties by SeanDuggan · · Score: 4, Informative

    Well, in theory, it's supposed to discourage them because fines will continue and increase if they continue such a practice. However, the companies are always able to switch to the next shady business practice.

    --
    This sig has absolutely no significance and serves only to take up screen space and waste the time of the reader.
  2. that fine is a pittance for them. by MMHere · · Score: 3, Informative
    According to Samsung's 2004 annual report, a $300M fine is pretty much a slap on the corporate wrist for them:

    2004 revenue was just under $122 BILLION, with net income of $11.8 BILLION.

    So the fine is 2.5% of one year's net income, 0.25% of one year's revenue, and a mere 0.14% of their total assets.

    This is incentive against cheating in future? How??

  3. Re:And How Does This Help Me? by kilgortrout · · Score: 3, Informative

    I know this is slashdot and no one reads the article but really. This was a criminal prosecution for price fixing brought by the US Dept of Justice and I can assure you those government attorneys will be getting their usual monthly slalary. The $300 million metioned in the article is a criminal fine to be paid to the government.
    And for the other legal retards out there, criminal fines are not normally divied up among members of the community; it goes into the treasury.