Jail terms for DRam price fixers
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Four executives at German memory supplier Infineon and its US subsidiary pleaded guilty to charges of illegally setting prices for PC memory chips, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced Thursday.
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Plus: Spammers go to jail, and laptops get LED backlights.
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Four executives at German chipmaker Infineon were jailed today on charges of engaging in illegal price fixing of PC memory chips according to the US Department of Justice.
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Four Infineon executives pled guilty for price fixing computer memory chips and will face a prison sentence of four to six months along with $250,000 in fines, reported the US Department of Justice on Thursday.
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Operation Cyberstorm nabs conspirators Four people convicted last year of scamming Microsoft by reselling discounted education versions of its software have been ordered to pay $5m in fines, return $20m to Microsoft and serve up to five years in prison.â¦
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Controversial plan could force file swappers to face criminal charges.
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A German software dealer has been convicted of counterfeiting Microsoft Corp. products and sentenced to three years in prison, authorities said Wednesday.
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Proposed law suggests fines, jail sentences for guilty parties.
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Four people have been sentenced to jail time and tens of millions of dollars in fines for buying discounted Microsoft software and then illegally reselling it at a profit.
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NEW YORK, December 6  - The US Department of Justice has imposed steep fines and announced jail terms for four senior executives of Infineon Technologies (IFX.
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(InfoWorld) - Anyone looking to add a bit more memory to their computers won a gift from the DRAM (dynamic RAM) industry. Heavy competition has caused prices to tumble and industry analysts predict further price declines. The contract price of the most widely used DRAM chips, 512Mb, DDR2 (double data rate, second generation) chips that run at 667MHz dropped 12.5 percent from two weeks ago to $1.75 each as of Thursday, a new low for this year according to DRAMeXchange Technology, which runs an online trading site for the chips. That's great news for users for three reasons. DRAM price declines increase the likelihood that PC vendors such as Hewlett-Packard and Dell will add more DRAM to the computers they sell, or offer extra DRAM as an incentive; it give users a chance to buy more DRAM on the cheap; and it generallyÂ spurs memory chip makers to move forward on new technologyÂ that will ultimately increase computing performance. Contract DRAM prices for DDR2-667 chips have plunged 70.5 percent so far this year to the Thursday low. The main reason is because memory chip makers built too many new production lines in anticipationÂ of strong demand for Microsoft's Windows Vista, which requires more DRAM per PC, as well as because stronger DRAM prices in general for the past few years was a sign to some that the market had stabilized, analysts say. DRAM prices may continue to decline a bit further, but downside appears limited, according to Gartner. Today's pricing is at a similar level to the lows reached in May of this year, when DRAM makers refused to sell because the price had hit their cash cost. "However, we may see some activity below this level, because some brokers and distributors who are holding inventory may be prepared to sell at a lower price to clear stock," the market researcher said. Over the years, DRAM makers have tended to place more emphasis on winning market share than on profits, and the current DRAM price declines are symptomatic of their battles. Companies have invested so much money in new factories that the increased output has caused a glut, leading to price declines. Prices for DRAM chips fellÂ almost 40 percent in the first half of this year, compared to the first half of 2006, offsetting a 66 percent increase in unit shipments, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association. Contract prices are typically renegotiated between DRAM makers and PC vendors every two weeks. Around four fifths of all DRAM is sold by contract, while the rest is sold on the spot market, just like commodities such as oil and gold. Â
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NEW YORK - Martha Stewart has been ordered to serve her sentence for lying about a stock sale at the federal prison in Alderson, W.Va., a source close to the case told The Associated Press on Wednesday.    Stewart and stockbroker Peter Bacanovic were convicted of lying about why she sold ImClone Systems Inc...
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Memory maker will pay $160 million in fines, DOJ says.
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NAND flash market goes under the scope The US Justice Department is busy handing out more RSVPs to NAND flash memory makers, cordially inviting them to a new market-wide price fixing investigation.â¦
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WASHINGTON Federal prosecutors have announced that they have cracked a global cartel that had illegally fixed prices of memory chips in personal computers and servers for three years, and that one of the companies involved, Infineon Technologies, had
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And MS rejigs compliance policy for SMEs An unnamed software dealer in Germany has been sentenced to three years in prison for selling unlicensed Microsoft products.â¦
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Three German and one American executives of microchip giant Infineon Technologies face jail terms and fines under plea agreements to settle a US probe into price-fixing, the Justice Department said.