Memorychip maker Mosel Vitelic Inc (茂矽) said yesterday that a settlement it has reached with 33 US states to resolve price-fixing allegations will have only limited impact on the company’s operations.
Mosel Vitelic and five other dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chipmakers reached a US$173 million agreement to settle price-fixing allegations with the 33 states.
The five other manufacturers are Micron Technology Inc of the US, NEC Electronics America Inc, Infineon Technologies AG of Germany, Hynix Semiconductor Inc of South Korea and Elpida Memory Inc of Japan.
While Mosel Vitelic declined to disclose the share it will pay for the settlement, it said it has assigned an unspecified provision for litigation costs and settlement payments, but added that the litigation process had incurred considerable costs for the company.
The US Department of Justice launched probes into price-fixing claims involving the six DRAM firms in 2002, alleging that all six colluded to fix prices between 1998 and 2002. The 33 US states moved to file a class-action lawsuit against the companies in 2006.
California Attorney General Edmund Brown Jr, who was involved in the investigation, said salespeople and management of the DRAM firms met frequently to exchange pricing information and agreed to overcharge customers.
Earlier this month, the US Department of Justice indicted Taiwanese flat-panel maker AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) and six of its executives on charges of price-fixing. The company has vowed to fight the charges to clear its name and protect its reputation and credibility.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last