The memory cartel saga continued today with three Samsung Electronics executives agreeing to go to the slammer and make amends for fixing DRAM prices.

Senior manager of DRAM sales Sun Woo Lee will serve eight months, while two lower level DRAM staffers Yeongho Kang and Young Woo Lee will serve seven months. All three have plead guilty to participating in a conspiracy to fix the prices of DRAM. All told, four companies - Hynix, Infineon, Elpida and Samsung - have been caught up in the memory scandal and paid $731m in fines.

The actions of the memory makers affected the likes of Dell, HP, Compaq, IBM, Gateway, Apple and their customers.

The Samsung executives join nine other executives at various companies who have been charged in the memory ordeal. The Samsung staffers will each pay a $250,000 fine in addition to going to the clink.

The US government has built a case showing that the memory makers held meetings from 1999 to 2002 in which they worked to set common prices for DRAM. During this period, PC maker executives such as Michael Dell accused the companies of acting like a cartel.

The US Department of Justice warned that its still in pursuit of people involved in the memory scandal.

“These are the first executives from Samsung to plead guilty to fixing prices in what is still an active investigation into antitrust violations in the DRAM industry,” said Thomas O. Barnett, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department’s Antitrust Division. “We will continue our efforts to bring to justice other domestic and foreign-based executives who were involved with fixing DRAM prices.” ®

Related stories

• Sun, Unisys pledge to tailor dropped memory chip suit (10 April 2007)
• California to sue DRAM makers over price-fixing claims (14 July 2006)
• LG sues Samsung for slander (31 March 2006)
• Korea may probe Samsung, Hynix price-fix claims (3 March 2006)
• Hynix staffers to plead guilty to DRAM price-fix charges (2 March 2006)
• Lawsuit claims Micron fixed memory prices (27 February 2006)
• Fourth DRAM cartel member fined $84m (31 January 2006)
• Samsung admits it rigged DRAM prices (1 December 2005)
• Samsung pays $300m to settle DRAM cartel case (13 October 2005)
• Micron hails WTO Hynix ruling (28 June 2005)
• DRAM price plunge hammers Hynix (5 May 2005)
• Hynix makes $185m price-fixing confession to US DoJ (21 April 2005)
• Elpida slashes FY2004 income forecast (8 April 2005)
• Micron remakes a profit (30 March 2005)
• Hynix ring-fences $342m against antitrust fines (29 March 2005)
• Infineon sales slip - and will fall further (25 January 2005)