Friday, October 30th 2020

IP Theft: UMC Pleads Guilty to US Court Charges of Trade Secret Theft, Faces $60 Million Fine

Taiwanese corporation United Micro Electronics (UMC) has pled guilty on charges of trade theft. The charges, originally pressed in November 2018 by US authorities, placed UMC and China's Fujian Jinhua in hot waters under suspicion of stealing trade secrets from US-based Micron technologies, one of the world's foremost players in memory semiconductor technologies. UMC's guilty plea serves as a way for the company to avoid heavier penalties, and includes a provision for the company's assistance in investigating Fujian Jinhua's actions in regards to this IP theft.

The whole story revolves around UMC's hiring of three Micron employees from Micron's subsidiary in Taiwan, Micron Memory Taiwan (MMT), back around September 2015. At least two of these employees migrated Micron trade secrets to UMC, which then inked a deal with china's Fujian Jinhua for the development of 32nm DRAM and "32Snm" DRAM technologies that Fujian Jinhua could then deploy for the manufacture of memory products - a deal which had Fujian Jinhua paying $300 million for equipment purchase plus $400 million for technology development to UMC. This all fell in line with the Chinese government's Made in China 2025 plan, which aims to bring the country to semiconductor independence from the western world. UMC says that the company itself didn't partake in the underhanded IP delivery to Fujian Jinhua, claiming instead that rogue employees did so of their own volition. The company further states that it only pleads guilty because according to the US Trade Secrets Act, the company still bears legal responsibilities for employee acts, whether or not top management is involved.
Sources: Financial Times, The Register
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31 Comments on IP Theft: UMC Pleads Guilty to US Court Charges of Trade Secret Theft, Faces $60 Million Fine

#26
Vayra86
xman2007Made in China, stolen from everywhere else.

Honestly the rest of the world should follow the US and boycott everything from them, let them keep their own crap in their own country and see how they get on with made in China 2025 then cause without all their crap exports their economy would crumble, let's stop pumping money into the communist regime who only care about control over their own people and soon if given the chance the rest of the world.
Right, let's pump more money into the capitalist war machine instead, where the US slowly devours all aspects of what's good in the world just as well. A lovely outlook, keeping power with the country that currently can't even help itself out of the shithole its in.

Nah, I'll pass. Its both worthless, time for something sane. We need a big transition and reinforcing the old world is not it.
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#27
lexluthermiester
R-T-BMore a space enthusiast who turned a blind eye to some very nefarious shit in pursuit of someone to fund his rocketry research.
Actually, that's not true either. Wernher VonBraun, like most scientists who worked for the Nazi's, was conscripted into service. They had no choice in the matter. So the truth is actually much better than the notions on offer in this discussion, which is getting off topic, so I digress...
Posted on Reply
#28
r9
Vayra86Right, let's pump more money into the capitalist war machine instead, where the US slowly devours all aspects of what's good in the world just as well. A lovely outlook, keeping power with the country that currently can't even help itself out of the shithole its in.

Nah, I'll pass. Its both worthless, time for something sane. We need a big transition and reinforcing the old world is not it.
Hey how's the weather in China ?
Posted on Reply
#29
Zareek
yotano211Big or small business have to make a profit. I own a business of selling online and in person, my small business needs a profit to reinvest back into the business. How else am I going to have money to upkeep this sailboat.
That's kind of my point, it should hurt their business. It's a punishment for essentially stealing from another business!
lexluthermiesterYour numbers are a bit off. However, even if we assume they're correct, 60million is a hit to their profits and will affect their bottom line hard for the entire year. 60million is not a slap on the wrist.
If their second two quarters average out the same as their first two quarters it represents about 5% of the Gross Revenue for the year 2020. That is barely a slap on the wrist.

Numbers are in Millions of NT. Current conversion rate is 1NT = $0.035 USD.
UMC 2020 Q2 Report
Posted on Reply
#30
Vayra86
r9Hey how's the weather in China ?
There is a continent in between the two as well, check the map. Its only the third largest economy in the world, so I can understand its easy to miss.

Especially for a bipartisan- conditioned citizen eh...
Posted on Reply
#31
Makaveli
lexluthermiester60million is not a slap on the wrist for that company, it a hefty chunk of their bottom line.

While I would generally agree with you, what are they going to do? They can't prosecute the company executives criminally because there would be no way to extradite them and that's IF you can prove who did what & when. It's much easier to prove the wrong-doing of a company selling products than it is to prove individual liability given that the company is an entity external to the US. What has been done is the best we can do.
United Microelectronics has a market capitalization of $12.43 billion and generates $4.93 billion in revenue each year.

Its a slap on the wrist!
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