What simply occurred? Corning Gorilla Glass is as widespread a sight in high-end smartphones as Qualcomm’s newest SoCs. The European Fee is conscious of this, and has now opened an investigation into whether or not Corning broke antitrust legal guidelines by abusing its dominant market place.
Corning’s alkali-aluminosilicate glass is utilized in an enormous vary of smartphones, tablets, notebooks, and wearables from the highest tech corporations.
EU antitrust regulators are involved that Corning’s exclusivity offers with cell phone makers and uncooked glass processing corporations could also be pushing rival glass makers out of enormous segments of the market.
Outgoing EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager mentioned that breaking a cellphone display screen was a irritating and dear expertise. Subsequently, robust competitors within the manufacturing of the glass that covers cell gadgets was essential to make sure low costs and a high-quality product.
“We’re investigating if Corning, a significant producer of this particular glass, might have tried to exclude rival glass producers, thereby depriving shoppers from cheaper and extra break-resistant glass,” Vestager mentioned.
The EU investigation will deal with unique sourcing obligations, which require gadget makers to supply all or practically all of their glass from Corning.
The investigation will even study the rebates the US firm provided for exclusivity offers and its clauses requiring cellphone makers to tell Corning of any aggressive presents and solely accepting them if the agency fails to cost match.
Additionally underneath scrutiny are Corning’s offers with corporations that course of uncooked glass that embrace unique buy obligations and no problem clauses, writes Bloomberg.
Corning can now carry the investigation to an finish by providing concessions to handle the EU competitors watchdog’s considerations. Whether it is discovered responsible of breaching EU antitrust guidelines, it faces being fined as a lot as 10% of its world turnover.
Corning reported an annual income of $12.59 billion for the yr ending December 31, 2023. Within the second quarter of 2024, Corning’s income was $3.25 billion, marking a 0.25% enhance in comparison with the identical quarter within the earlier yr.
Corning is simply the newest US firm to be investigated by the EU over potential anti-competitive practices. Meta’s ad-free subscription mannequin, Google’s digital markets act compliance, and Apple’s App Retailer practices are additionally being probed.
