US Wants ASML to Stop Product Shipments to China

[AleksandarK]

ASML is one of the critical semiconductors companies, as they provide tools for making actual silicon. Located in the Netherlands, they are famous for their DUV and EUV lithography tools, used to etch designs onto silicon wafers. According to the report from Bloomberg, the United States governing body is negotiating with the Dutch government to restrict the export of ASML's products to China. This came to affection following US Deputy Commerce Secretary Don Graves's visit to the Netherlands to discuss supply chain issues and meeting with ASML Chief Executive Officer Peter Wennink. While these suggested export restrictions could be beneficial to the strategic placement of US against China, it would hurt ASML's revenue as sales in China accounted for a 16% share of the company's revenue in 2021.

It is recorded that the Chinese spending spree on tools has been the greatest among every country, lasting for two years in a row. By banning ASML from exporting its lithography tools to China, the US could theoretically halt Chinese plans for achieving the government's intended semiconductor independence. The talks with the Dutch government and ASML are still a work in progress, so we are yet to see if the deal is finalized. Additionally, it is worth pointing out that the major US semiconductor manufacturing tool makers like Applied Materials and Lam Research are already banned from exporting to China.


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[the54thvoid]

A wee bit over-reachy, no matter what your perspective.

 

[nametrends]

A few years ago they didn't allow China to use the International Space Station, and now they complain that China doesn't give them access to the space station. What a similar scene.

 

[Vayra86]

A wee bit over-reachy, no matter what your perspective.

Its not happening, most likely.

Dutch gov already stated as much as 'we'll direct our own course wrt China, together with the EU'
ASML is saying as much as 'DUV is old crap, we don't care'

 

[the54thvoid]

Hard to avoid politics on this one but posts that are clearly antagonist ("x" country sucks" sort of crap) will be deleted.

If you can't be constructive, don't post.

 

[PerfectWave]

why do you write political article? Nothing to do with tech news

 

[prtskg]

why do you write political article? Nothing to do with tech news

This is political tech news.

 

[Daven]

why do you write political article? Nothing to do with tech news

ASML and the ramifications of making chips we all use is not tech news?

 

[zlobby]

A wee bit over-reachy, no matter what your perspective.

Sadly...

ASML are the de facto solo enablers for what we have today. Unless some 3-letter agencies don't do some shady stuff to ASML execs, ASML can give the finger to whomever they choose to, with almost zero consequences.

 

[Wirko]

I think there's also a commercial-political-tech reason for the US to try that, beside political-tech reasons. ASML can barely produce enough DUV machines for TSMC+Samsung+the West, all of which are investing extreme amounts of money in new fabs.
Keep in mind that a Zen 3 CCD, for example, has four EUV layers but also tens of DUV layers on top of those, so for every EUV scanner that processes wafers, there need to be many DUV scanners in operation, some of them doing multiple patterning.

 

[Prima.Vera]

I never understand, how come there is this monopoly of ASML and no other companies are there to challenge them? I mean, the US government instead of trying to bad them to sell in China, why are not they investing proper money in developing their own company to produce those. And also research.

 

[R-T-B]

A few years ago they didn't allow China to use the International Space Station, and now they complain that China doesn't give them access to the space station. What a similar scene.

Who on earth wants access to China's crappy station?

I don't mean this in a xenophobic way... that station is just old tech vs the ISS...

I never understand, how come there is this monopoly of ASML and no other companies are there to challenge them? I mean, the US government instead of trying to bad them to sell in China, why are not they investing proper money in developing their own company to produce those. And also research.

Primarily, the setup cost us so huge no one wants to bother.

 

[jsfitz54]

The translation tool used here is not doing its job well: "This came to affection following US Deputy"

 

[RH92]

US giving a good lesson of democracy to the rest of the world the empire of lies is on its downfall and the panic really shows !

Speaking about ASML obviously their best interest is to pursue business with anyone willing to do business with them .

 

[Richards]

If china gets euv machine the whole world gets chip chips from china..

 

[the54thvoid]

Final warning. Keep it constructive, leave the nationalist baggage at home.

 

[ZoneDymo]

I never understand, how come there is this monopoly of ASML and no other companies are there to challenge them? I mean, the US government instead of trying to bad them to sell in China, why are not they investing proper money in developing their own company to produce those. And also research.

Because its just not that easy, that is what makes what Tesla has achieved so special, so many others think they can do the same but cannot.
There is so much involved.
Heck just look at Intel, freaking INTEL trying to get into the gpu space....and how much they are having trouble...

 

[Space Lynx]

Humanity in general just makes me sad these days. This whole concept of the nation state and invisible lines drawn on a map are going to destroy humanity in the end. Capable of so much, yet so little... the ironic existence of our species. Self-aware conscious beings capable of creating paradise, and yet also ruin of the greatest scale...

Quite bizarre really when you think of it.

Heck just look at Intel, freaking INTEL trying to get into the gpu space....and how much they are having trouble...

this really did surprise me as well... Intel engineers are considered the best in the world, so I thought sure they would save the competition in GPU market... was not expecting them to struggle so much...

 

[Shihab]

If one were to go the cheap and easy route of assuming that this is an attempt to keep China hooked and maintain a leverage to deter another Putin-esque idiocy, I'd say ASML's profit would be hurt even more if anything were to go wrong in Taiwan or eastern Asia in general...
Not necessarily saying the US is entirely in the right or anything here...

 

[Dr_b_]

China is copying, nay, stealing the tech and reverse engineering these machines, and will be developing its own, and then stop buying them altogether from ASML in the near future. There are already patent infringement disputes about this.

 

[zlobby]

Humanity in general just makes me sad these days. This whole concept of the nation state and invisible lines drawn on a map are going to destroy humanity in the end. Capable of so much, yet so little... the ironic existence of our species. Self-aware conscious beings capable of creating paradise, and yet also ruin of the greatest scale...

Quite bizarre really when you think of it.



this really did surprise me as well... Intel engineers are considered the best in the world, so I thought sure they would save the competition in GPU market... was not expecting them to struggle so much...

One of the most touted solutions to Fermi's paradox is that all sentient civilizations cannot evolve past the stage we are in.

 

[PapaTaipei]

That's called embargo. Embargo is a form of war.

 

[KainXS]

China is copying, nay, stealing the tech and reverse engineering these machines, and will be developing its own, and then stop buying them altogether from ASML in the near future. There are already patent infringement disputes about this.

China is not our friend

10000% true and I have seen it firsthand

I used to work for a company that created their own Novel MOCVD and Ion Beam Deposition tools and this happened to them. A customer of theirs sold one of their MOCVD tools to china illegally and the chinese company that bought it then reverse engineered the tool and then started distributing it internationally. Eventually the company I used to work for tried to sue said company for patent infringement because the tool was cloned basically but had to go to china in order to do so because its impossible to touch these companies outside of china and it didn't even make it to trial. Its a far bigger problem than most people realize.

 

[AdmiralThrawn]

I am of the opinion that we need to move all yes 100% of our manufacturing out of China. Bring it back to countries like USA, Japan, and Germany. Why are we forking trillions of dollars to a country that wants to destroy us? Especially when companies like apple have child labor making iphones over there.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

10000% true and I have seen it firsthand

I used to work for a company that created their own Novel MOCVD and Ion Beam Deposition tools and this happened to them. A customer of theirs sold one of their MOCVD tools to china illegally and the chinese company that bought it then reverse engineered the tool and then started distributing it internationally. Eventually the company I used to work for tried to sue said company for patent infringement because the tool was cloned basically but had to go to china in order to do so because its impossible to touch these companies outside of china and it didn't even make it to trial. Its a far bigger problem than most people realize.

This is exactly why the China-US trade wars started, China steals IP to under cut the market so dependencies focus on it.

This being a political article, my opinion is that I can see this happening under Trump, so its kind of surprising to me that this happened under the current administration.

I am of the opinion that we need to move all yes 100% of our manufacturing out of China. Bring it back to countries like USA, Japan, and Germany. Why are we forking trillions of dollars to a country that wants to destroy us? Especially when companies like apple have child labor making iphones over there.

I am not sure thats entirely the right move, I mean there has to be something of worth trading with China just to keep political talks happening, this kinda of move could anger China into desperate actions. I'd rather see tariffs apply/increase instead of trade sanctions.