Millions of pages of documents have been hidden from the public in a high-profile federal court antitrust case between two computer giants, illustrating how parties are able to essentially secretly litigate disputes in public courts. A model holds an Intel chip In 2006. Intel has been accused of unfair trade practices.
In September 2006, Delaware District Court Judge Joseph Farnan Jr. approved a protective order in AMD v. Intel, a long-running case in which the computer hardware behemoth Intel is being sued by its chief microprocessor rival over alleged anti-trust practices. With the protective order, Farnan effectively vaulted vast portions of evidence in the case. Predicting that "hundreds of millions of pages of documentation" would accumulate, Farnan moved to safeguard the companies' trade secrets, and make discovery documents easier to produce to the litigants.
Two years later, some reporters and lawyers say it's one of the most sweeping protective orders they've seen. So much so that many basic details of the allegations against Intel are still scant - even though AMD filed suit against Intel in 2005, and two foreign trade commissions have ruled against Intel in the last several years for violating antimonopoly or antitrust regulations.
What is known: AMD claims Intel monopolized the microprocessor industry by providing exclusivity agreements and rebates rewarding only loyal customers. Courts have generally decided loyalty rebates are exclusionary and a violation of anticompetitive practices when a competitor would have to price the product below their cost of production to be able to compete with the seller.
