New Delhi: Samsung Electronics will be paying a fine of dollar three hundred million (approximately Rs 12,60,00,00,000) for price-fixing.
This is the largest criminal fine obtained by the US Justice Department during the Bush administration.
The US Justice Department accuses Samsung and its US subsidiary of conspiring with other chipmakers, to fix prices of memory chips sold to computer manufacturers.
The department says that this drives up the prices of chips used in products like computers, cell-phones and cameras.
US anti-trust authorities say, the company has agreed to plead guilty to the charges.
The government's anti-trust chief Thomas Varnett said "The dollar 300 million criminal fine which Samsung has agreed to pay is the second largest fine in the history of the anti-trust division and is the largest criminal fine obtained by the Justice Department during the Bush administration."
Samsung and its US subsidiary were accused by the US Justice Department of conspiring with other chip makers, between April 1999 and June 2002, to fix the prices of memory chips sold to some computer and server manufacturers.
Under the plea agreement, which must still be approved by US District Court in San Francisco, Samsung has agreed to cooperate in the ongoing investigations, the government said.
Samsung would become the third chipmaker to plead guilty in the wide-ranging probe of the prices of dynamic random access memory, or DRAM, chips.
The government's ongoing investigation has already netted guilty pleas and hefty fines from Germany's Infineon Technologies AG and another South Korean manufacturer, Hynix Semiconductor Inc.
US rival Micron Technology Inc has cooperated with the probe.
The Justice Department said fines totaling more than dollar 646 million have resulted from the department's investigation.
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