Advocates Ask DOJ to Probe Apple’s Electronic Supply Chain Tactics

DOJ should investigate Apple for “illegal monopolization” of global electronic supply chains, consumer groups wrote the department Tuesday. The American Economic Liberties Project, the Demand Progress Education Fund, the Tech Oversight Project and X-Lab signed. Enforcers should probe Apple’s reported deal with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company to “exclusively buy TSMC’s entire output of the most advanced silicon chips,” they wrote. Apple is the largest electronic component buyer in the world and has used its dominant position to “demand exclusive deals with suppliers, squeeze prices below the level of profitability, and lock up the capacity of suppliers in order to prevent competitors from using them,” they wrote. Apple’s conduct as an electronics component buyer is separate but related to its “monopolization” of the final market for smartphones, about which DOJ has already filed an antitrust lawsuit, the groups wrote. The company’s practices have “undermined competition in markets for silicon chips and other electronics components as well as allowed Apple to extend those advantages to the final markets for smartphones,” they wrote. DOJ didn’t comment.