New York's attorney-general has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Intel, claiming that the company used "illegal threats and collusion" to dominate the marketplace for computer microprocessors.

Andrew Cuomo claims that the world's biggest computer chipmaker tried to prevent the sale of competitors' products by paying billions of dollars in kickbacks to computer manufacturers. The attorney-general also says Intel retaliated against companies that did too much business with its rivals.

Intel, whose microprocessors run billions of personal computers and servers, was fined a record $1.45 billion by the European Commission for antitrust violations over similar allegations in May.

The Commission found that between 2002 and 2007, Intel had paid manufacturers and a retailer to favour its chips over those of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). Intel has denied the charges against it and has filed an appeal against the European Commission’s ruling.

Mr Cuomo said the company's practices were revealed in internal e-mails obtained in an investigation that has lasted for nearly two years.

“Rather than compete fairly, Intel used bribery and coercion to maintain a stranglehold on the market. Intel’s actions not only unfairly restricted potential competitors, but also hurt average consumers who were robbed of better products and lower prices,” Mr Cuomo said in a statement.

The US Federal Trade Commission has been investigating Intel since 2008 over similar charges but has not begun formal proceedings against the company.

Intel has been regularly accused of abusing its dominant position in the chip market to keep ahead of rivals, principally Advanced Micro Devices.

The New York charges alleged that Intel paid out billions of dollars to computer makers such as Hewlett Packard, Dell and IBM to stop them using AMD chips and threatened to reduce partnerships with them.

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