European regulators opened on Tuesday an antritrust probe against Samsung Electronics to determine whether the South Korean group has distorted competition in European mobile device markets. The European Commission said it will investigate whether the group went too far last year when it spought injunctions against competitors in various EU national courts, alleging infringements of Samsung's patent rights.
The probe will seek to determine whether Samsung "has failed to honour its irrevocable commitment given in 1998 to the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) to license any standard essential patents relating to European mobile telephony standards on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms." The European Union's competition watchdog said it "will examine whether such behaviour amounts to an abuse of a dominant position prohibited" by EU laws.