WASHINGTON, Jan. 30 (UPI) -- Japan's Elpida Memory will plead guilty to charges it conspired to fix prices for memory chips sold to the computer industry.
The U.S. Justice Department said Monday that Elpida would pay an $84 million fine for its role in an alleged conspiracy among four companies and five individuals to control the price of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) devices sold from 1999 and 2002 to companies such as IBM, Dell and Compaq.
DRAM is a key component of the semiconductor and computing industries. It is used for high-speed memory in personal computers, servers, telecom equipment and consumer electronics. Prosecutors said DRAM product sales in the United States totaled $7.7 billion in 2004.
Elpida is the fifth-largest DRAM producer in the world and agreed to cooperate with the U.S. investigation.
