Qualcomm Inc claimed the European Union investigators “engaged in a biased investigation” when fining them AU$1.55 billion in 2018, for pressuring Apple into exclusively buying its 4G chips.

Miguel Rato, a lawyer for Qualcomm, told the EU General Court, that the investigators let Apple “dictate the evidence, narrative and conclusions” in what he called “gross and indefensible maladministration.”

Lawyer Nicholas Khan told the Luxemborg court that the EU’s case against Qualcomm “is about some $3 billion that Qualcomm paid Apple in return for exclusivity over Apple’s requirements for chipsets compliant with the LTE standard on which 4G mobile communications are based,” saying the deal featured “a carefully crafted combination of inducements through rising payments and threats through reimbursement obligations if exclusivity was broken.”

EU officials concluded in 2018 that Qualcomm’s payments to Apple were illegal, and issued the large fine.