- It has now become official U.S. policy to pressure Allies not to honour their chip service contracts with China.
- The U.S. government is asking other countries to force their companies to violate their binding contractual agreements with Chinese customers to curb semiconductor development.
- The request has met with some resistance from industry and governments because of the potential impact, with Allies including Germany, Japan, South Korea and the Netherlands involved.
Not provide service to key components
The U.S. government has publicly confirmed that it is pressuring allied chip manufacturing tool suppliers, such as ASML, to stop maintaining the chip manufacturing tools that have been sold to China.
“We are pushing to not service these critical components, so these are discussions that we are having with our Allies,” Alan Estevez, undersecretary of Commerce for industry and safety, told reporters at a briefing in Washington.
In effect, the U.S. government is asking other countries to force their companies to violate their binding contractual agreements with Chinese customers to curb semiconductor development.
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Resisted because of the potential impact
The request has met with some resistance from industry and government because of the potential impact. The Allies involved include Germany, Japan, South Korea and the Netherlands. The latter is home to ASML, a major supplier of lithography equipment and currently the only company in the world able to supply chipmakers with extreme ultraviolet (EUV) kits for state-of-the-art semiconductor production nodes.
A few years ago, the Dutch government banned the export of ASML’s EUV products to China, and last year the Netherlands was persuaded to join the United States in tightening export restrictions and adding new regulations covering some of its deep ultraviolet (DUV) equipment.
A Dutch delegation visited Beijing this week, and Chinese Trade Minister Geoffrey van Leeuwen told the Netherlands that the country was seen as a “trustworthy” economic and trade partner. The two are said to have discussed topics such as the export of lithography machines and cooperation in the semiconductor industry.
‘No force can stop the pace of China’s progress’
Xi Jinping told Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte during his visit that attempts to limit China’s access to technology would not stop the country’s progress.
“Creating technological barriers and cutting off industrial chains and supply chains will only lead to division and confrontation,” Xi said, while reminding Rutte that China is ASML’s second largest market after Taiwan.
The Dutch prime minister responded that decoupling was not his government’s policy either, “because any action that harms China’s development interests will only be a boomerang.”
Rutte declined to answer questions about whether his government would take action to prevent ASML from maintaining tools for Chinese customers, Reuters reported.
