Dell accuses drive vendors of price-fixing scandal

Vendor seeks damages as it claims it paid over the odds for optical disk drives from Samsung, Sony, Hitachi and others

Dell has accused a handful of hardware manufacturers of being involved in a price-fixing scandal, according to a report from Bloomberg.

In a complaint filed to federal court in Texas, Dell claims that the makers of optical disk drives conspired to fix their products' prices between 2004 and 2010.

Samsung Electronics, Sony, Toshiba, Hitachi-LG, BenQ and Konninlijke Philips were all defendants in the lawsuit filed by Dell.

In the complaint, Dell claims it paid over the odds for the drives and is looking for triple damages to compensate for the overcharges due to what it believes is a breach of contract and violation of US anti-trust laws.

According to Bloomberg, the complaint added that Dell had said that four Hitachi-LG executives had already admitted to taking part in the price-fixing conspiracy.

Dell was unavailable for comment when contacted by CRN.