The European Commission recently announced that it has launched an anti-monopoly investigation against Broadcom, which will assess whether Broadcom is obstructing market competition through an exclusive agreement and violating EU anti-monopoly laws.

Broadcom is a leader in single chip for set-top box and modem systems. The European Commission has questioned the exclusiveness of the contracts signed by Broadcom with seven customers, which may result in these customers only purchasing system single-chip, front-end chips and Wi-Fi chips from Broadcom. These exclusive rules will affect competition and innovation in these markets.

According to the information already collected by the European Commission, Broadcom has some improper operations. First, it has an exclusive procurement obligation with its customers; Second, when customers only buy chips from Broadcom or reach a certain amount of purchase, Broadcom will give the Customer rebate or other preferential terms; Third, improper bundling methods; Fourth, deliberately reduce the interoperability between Broadcom and other products. The above information allows the European Commission to initiate a formal investigation into whether Broadcom violates the anti-monopoly law.