By Sam Boughedda
Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM), the US chipmaker, has won an EU antitrust lawsuit, according to a report by Reuters.
The company has won a fight against a potential 997 million euro (around $1.05 billion) fine set by EU regulators four years ago as part of a crackdown on big tech.
In 2018, the EU Commission declared Qualcomm paid billions to Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) between 2011 and 2016 to use only its chips in all its iPhones and iPads to freeze out rivals such as Intel (NASDAQ:INTC).
Several companies were fined at the time, including Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL), while Apple and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) are being investigated for anti-competitive practices.
However, Europe's second highest court, the General Court, has rejected the EU finding, faulting the EU regulator over its handling of the case.
According to Reuters, the judges said: "a number of procedural irregularities affected Qualcomm's rights of defence and invalidate the Commission's analysis of the conduct."
"The Commission did not provide an analysis which makes it possible to support the findings that the payments concerned had actually reduced Apple’s incentives to switch to Qualcomm's competitors in order to obtain supplies of LTE chipsets for certain iPad models to be launched in 2014 and 2015," they added.
An appeal by the EU competition enforcer is possible, with the Commission saying its next steps will be to study the ruling and its implications.
Qualcomm stock has gained 1.5% in early Wednesday trading.