WASHINGTON -- U.S. antitrust regulators are moving toward filing a complaint against Intel Corp after the European Union fined the world's biggest chipmaker $1.45 billion for engaging in anticompetitive practices, sources said on Friday.
The U.S. Federal Trade Commission's investigation into Intel's business practices is broader. U.S. regulators are looking into Intel's microprocessor business along with its chipset business, said the sources, who asked not to be named.
Intel sells about 80 percent of all microprocessors, which are the brains that run PCs.
Three of the four commissioners on the Federal Trade Commission, which opened a formal inquiry in June 2008, are in favor of filing a complaint against Intel, the sources said.
"They're close," one source said. "They said it could be a matter of weeks or a matter of months when the vote happens."
Intel believes "that our business practices are lawful and ... (work) to the benefit to consumers," said Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy.
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