WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. computer-chip industry wasn't harmed or threatened with injury by Taiwan imports sold for less than fair value, a federal agency ruled Friday.
The decision by the U.S. International Trade Commission ends a complaint from Micron Technology Inc. of Boise, Idaho, that charged Taiwan was dumping chips of one megabit and above. The chips are called DRAMS, for dynamic random access memory, which help computers run various programs.The Commerce Department earlier determined that Taiwan sold DRAMS in the United States at less than fair value. But under U.S. law, dumping occurs only when the sale hurts the domestic industry, coupled with selling at prices are below cost or below the sales price in the home market.
As a result of the commission's decision, the Commerce Department won't impose anti-dumping duties on these imports.
Taiwan's high-tech companies build 10 percent of the world's chips. The value of the 1998 imports at issue was $450 million.
There were 14 U.S. producers of DRAMS in 1998, with plants in California, Idaho, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas, Vermont, Virginia and Washington. Shipments totaled $1.4 billion that year.