Intel is being sued again… This time from FTC

Intel is being sued again… Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued Intel finally. I expected this day to come. Just not so soon. As expected too, INTC stock price dropped while AMD and NVDA stocks price went up…

INTC, AMD and NVDA performance from 15th to 18th December 2009

What FTC wants (taken from AnandTech):

1. For Intel to stop doing all of the things mentioned above.
2. Intel cannot require OEMs to purchase only Intel CPUs and GPUs, purchase them in specific quantities, or to not purchase competitors GPUs and CPUs. This is effectively a stab at the rebates Intel has been offering for bulk purchasing, and the advertising help Intel has been offering to bulk purchasers.
3. To stop prioritizing CPU shipments to loyal OEMs.
4. To stop withholding technical support from disloyal OEMs.
5. For Intel to be disallowed from producing/distributing any software or hardware that unreasonably excludes or inhibits the performance of competitors’ GPUs and CPUs.
6. To stop selling things below cost. The FTC is defining this as being the average variable cost plus a “contribution to Intel’s fixed sunk costs in an appropriate multiple of that average variable cost.”
7. For Intel to do a few different things about the versions of their compiler that put AMD at a disadvantage (which the FTC is calling the Defective Compiler): offer a substitute compiler to customers for free that is not a Defective Compiler, or to compensate customers in switching to another compiler, to provide notice to software buyers of products compiled using the Defective Compiler that they may need to replace their software.
8. To stop Intel from making misleading statements.
9. To prevent Intel from coercing benchmark organizations into adopting misleading benchmarks.
10. For Intel to license the QPI and DMI buses to 3rd party chipset manufacturers.
11. For Intel to not block the Global Foundries deal (AMD and Intel already settled this) or any similar deal that VIA might make.
12. For Intel to stop badmouthing competing products unless they have solid scientific evidence.
13. For Intel to foot the bill for the independent organization that will monitor this.

FTC helps Nvidia a lots. If all of the above does happen, Nvidia will have its chipset department running again. Did you see any Nvidia powered Core i5 or i7 motherboard lately? Nope. And you won’t need to use underpowered netbook with Intel chipset again. And wait for Nvidia ION platform 2 now. 😉