iPhone Glass Supplier Corning Faces EU Antitrust Probe

[I7guy]

…as was already been linked and told to I7Guy - but met with refusal to engage and dismissed with a one-liner.

Just as your earlier explanation how Corning may have violated EU antitrust law was coldly stonewalled by him.

Just like yall thought in epic vs apple apple was a cinch to lose in all points here we are again playing arm chair lawyers with a sprinkle of ChatGPT. Customer supplier exclusivity arrangements are not illegal.

 

[AppliedMicro]

Customer supplier exclusivity arrangements are not illegal.

You are still refusing to engage with the alleged violation in question - by yet again generalisingly paraphrasing it into a strawman of "Customer supplier exclusivity arrangements".

 

[bsolar]

Customer supplier exclusivity arrangements are not illegal.

They are not illegal per se like, but in the US they can be illegal under the rule of reason, whereas in the EU they can be illegal as described in the link provided, which is basically EU's version of the rule of reason.

To be clear of what we are talking about, in the context of the US antitrust which maybe is more familiar to you and from which parallels to EU doctrine can be easily drawn:

• Per se describes actions that are inherently illegal, regardless of the effect of the action on the market. An example of per se illegal action is price-fixing. Regardless of the effect on the market, price fixing is automatically an antitrust violation.
• Actions that need to be evaluated under the rule of reason are not inherently illegal, but they can constitute an antitrust violation if their effect on the market unreasonably restrains trade. An example of action that needs to be evaluated under the rule of reason is exclusive dealing, which is legal if it doesn't unreasonably restrain trade and it becomes an antitrust violation if it does.

Key quotes from the provided links:

In US law, the term illegal per se means that the act is inherently illegal. Thus, an act is illegal without extrinsic proof of any surrounding circumstances such as lack of scienter (knowledge) or other defenses. Acts are made illegal per se by statute, constitution or case law.

The rule of reason is a legal doctrine used to interpret the Sherman Antitrust Act, one of the cornerstones of United States antitrust law. While some actions like price-fixing are considered illegal per se, other actions, such as possession of a monopoly, must be analyzed under the rule of reason and are only considered illegal when their effect is to unreasonably restrain trade.

The link describing EU's regulation was already provided but basically applies the same rationale as the US, with exclusive dealing being either legal or a violation depending on the effect on the market.