Infineon Fined for US Price-fixing

German microchip giant Infineon Technologies agreed to plead guilty and to pay a $160 million (€131.8 million) fine for participating in "an international conspiracy to fix prices," US officials said late Wednesday. Under the plea agreement, which must be approved by a judge, Infineon has agreed to cooperate in the investigation into price-fixing of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips, the most commonly used semiconductor memory product. A one-count felony charge filed in the US District Court in San Francisco alleges that Infineon participating in a price-fixing scheme from July 1, 1999 to June 15, 2002 with unnamed companies, the US Justice Department (DoJ) said. Infineon said in a statement, "the wrongdoing charged by the DoJ was limited to certain (computer) customers. Infineon is already been in contact with these customers and has achieved or is in the process of achieving settlements with all of these ... customers. Infineon strongly condemns any attempt to fix or stabilize prices."