Samsung Electronics and other nine memory chip makers were fined a total 331 million Euros for illegally fixing prices by EU regulators on Wednesday. A penalty of 145.73 million Euros against Samsung has been levied by the EU antitrust watchdog, while Infineon was asked to pay 56.70 million and Hynix Semiconductor was fined 51.47 million for an association of dynamic random access memory chip makers that operated from July 1998 to June 2002.

The other companies in the cartel include Hitachi Ltd which was levied a fine of 20.41 million Euros, Mitsubishi Electric was fined16.61 million, Toshiba Corp was asked to pay 17.64 million and Nanya Technology was fined 1.80 million.

Elpida Memory Inc was fined 8.50 million Euros together with NEC Corp and Hitachi, while NEC got a separate 20.41 million euro fine.

Samsung Electronics and Hynix are known as the world's largest and second-largest memory chip makers respectively. These DRAM chips are used in personal computers, printers, mobile phones as well as game consoles.

Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia said, “By acknowledging their participation in a cartel the companies have allowed the Commission to bring this long-running investigation to a close and to free up resources to investigate other suspected cartels”.