Samsung Electronics is accused by the US Government of driving
up the price of memory chips used in PCs and servers, called DRAM.
He was accused of violating the Sherman Act.
The US Department of Justice has said that Quinn has agreed to
the jail term and fine but that this must now be approved by a
federal court in San Francisco.
“Prison time for price-fixers remains the most potent deterrent
to illegal cartel activity,” said Thomas Barnett, assistant
Attorney General in charge of the DoJ's antitrust division.
“Today’s action sends a clear message – those who engage in
price-fixing schemes will be held accountable for their illegal
conduct.”
Quinn is the fourth Samsung executive to plead guilty in the
case. He is the 13th person to be found guilty in the probe, which
has gathered $731 million in fines. Samsung pleaded guilty and paid
a $300m criminal fine in 2005.
The DoJ spent more than three years investigating price fixing
between DRAM manufacturers between 1999 and 2003.
Other firms which have pleaded guilty include Hynix, which in
April 2005 agreed to a $185 million fine and Infineon, which agreed
to pay a $160 million fine in September 2004. In January, Japanese
manufacturer Elpida Memory agreed to plead guilty and pay an $84
million fine.
The DoJ's case claims that the price fixing scandal affected the
businesses of some of IT's biggest names, including Dell,
Hewlett-Packard, Compaq Computer, IBM, Apple, Gateway and Sun.
The case against Quinn said that he conspired with unnamed
employees from other memory makers to fix the prices of DRAM sold
original equipment manufacturers from on or about 1st April 2001 to
on or about 15th June 2002 said the DoJ. It also said that he
coordinated bids on a 5th December 2001 Sun Microsystems
auction.
"Quinn is charged with carrying out the price-fixing conspiracy
by participating in meetings, conversations, and communications
with competitors to discuss the prices of DRAM to be sold to
certain customers [and] agreeing with competitors to coordinate
bids submitted to Sun Microsystems Inc," said a DoJ statement.
“This is the most recent charge in our continuing efforts to
bring to justice both domestic and foreign-based executives who
were involved with fixing DRAM prices,” said Scott Hammond, the
Antitrust Division’s Director of Criminal Enforcement. “We are
still very actively investigating antitrust violations in the DRAM
industry.”
