News groups urge access to antitrust case information

More than two dozen news organizations expressed concern on Thursday that a judge was prepared to severely restrict public access to information in Advanced Micro Devices Inc's antitrust lawsuit against Intel Corp.

In a letter to US District Judge Joseph J. Farnan Jr., the organizations, including The Associated Press, said an improperly crafted protective order "may have a serious impact on the public's right to know about this important and newsworthy litigation."

Neither Intel nor AMD, fierce rivals in microprocessor manufacturing, has filed a public request to seal information in the case, though both sides are currently in negotiations over details on how to proceed with the suit.

Protective orders are common in antitrust cases, and meant to protect trade secrets and other confidential information.

"We ask that the court reject any prospective protective order that seeks to seal documents based merely on the grounds of `embarrassment' or that is unacceptably founded on unsubstantiated claims to trade secrets or competitive harm through disclosure," the letter says.

The news organizations -- including ABC, CBS, NBC, Knight Ridder Inc, The New York Times Co, Reuters, Tribune Co, Gannett Co, Hearst Corp and The Washington Post -- suggested they would intervene legally if they deemed any protective order too restrictive.

In its lawsuit filed in late June, AMD claimed Intel strong-armed PC makers by offering rebates in exchange for contracts that limited or excluded them from using non-Intel chips. Sunnyvale, California-based AMD filed the suit in Delaware federal court in June.

No trial date has been set.

Intel, the world's largest chip maker, has denied doing anything illegal.

AMD is seeking billions of dollars in the suit, which some experts say could take years to litigate and rival Microsoft Corp's landmark antitrust battle in complexity.

"The outcome of this case will affect virtually everybody in some way or another," said the letter's author, Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press and a co-signatory. "Consumers, shareholders and the public have a lot of interest in what's going on in this particular case."

AMD spokesman Michael Silverman said that any protective order should not allow Intel "to hide its improper and anticompetitive actions."

A spokesman for Santa Clara-based Intel, Chuck Mulloy, called the intervention by the news organizations unduly hasty.