A former Chinese employee – based in China – of ASML is suspected of having stolen information on the operation of the EUV engraving machines. These machines, which cost 170 million dollars each, are the only ones in the world capable of burning electronic chips below 7 nm. A unique technology that China ardently covets.
If you are reading this article on your smartphone, be aware that the chip that makes it work must have gone through a one-of-a-kind machine… some secrets of its manufacture have just been stolen. The story reported by the media ofBloomberg economic information affects the Dutch giant ASML and more particularly its flagship: the EUV stepper (or scanner). This 170 million Euro state-of-the-art machine is one of a kind. Reputed to be the most “precious and complex” in the world, is the only one currently on the market capable of etching circuits whose size is less than 7 nm. That is almost all of the medium and high-end mobile chips sold on the planet.
Theft is not trivial, and this, in more ways than one. Because it touches a “national treasure” of the Netherlands. Which is, with Japan, the only country in the world to produce steppers. Then, because it takes place in the traditional scenario that places China as an economic spy on Western technologies. The story indeed concerns a former Chinese employee of the Chinese branch of ASML. Because China is a very important market for ASML: if it is forbidden to sell its super EUV machines to Chinese companies, the latter nevertheless have the right to buy the “classic” so-called DUV machines. And as for EUV machines, ASML is also the king of DUV machines (ahead of Nikon) and therefore has a significant presence in China – 1500 employees. A presence from which comes a potentially (very) embarrassing leak of information…
A security breach that weighs heavily on ASML
The theft of this information is a major event not only for ASML, but also for governments. “ASML informed us of this incident. An investigation is ongoing into this and I await it,” Dutch Trade Minister Liesje Schreinemacher told reporters. “It is therefore very worrying that such a large and reputable company is affected by economic espionage. “If ASML did not give precise details on the exact nature of what was stolen, first elements compiled by Bloomberg report access to documents from an internal tool compiling technical information relating to systems. lithographs.
Read also : Semiconductors: the USA wants to deprive China of ASML’s precious Dutch machines (July 2022)
In a triple alliance of the Netherlands with Japan and the USA, and at the instigation of the latter, China is indeed subject to a form of embargo on the very latest chip-engraving technologies. Any breach, even involuntary, of this embargo may therefore have legal but also diplomatic consequences. China, for its part, has obviously not commented on the facts and actions of an individual – but the suspicions are strong. On the one hand, because the country is in full frenzy of purchase of machines of lithography. New, old, penultimate, even very old generations, Chinese industrialists buy absolutely everything that lies on the market. As much to satisfy internal production needs… as the needs and ambitions of technological independence.
Read also: Engraving in 2 nm: the USA and Japan want to join forces to go faster… and ward off China (May 2022)
Because China and its manufacturers speak openly of their desire to develop their own lithography machine sectors, in particular EUVs, which are the only ones capable of engraving the chips of the future. By cunning, the founder SMIC succeeded in producing fairly simple 7 nm chips thanks to numerous passages in DUV (Deep Ultraviolet). But only EUV (Extreme Ultraviolet) technology can overcome this limit and look towards the fineness of a few angstroms. This is why all companies in the world of semiconductors are in China’s crosshairs. Especially the manufacturers of steppers such as Nikon or ASML. This is not his first case of espionage by China.
The Specter of Long-Term Coordinated Espionage
Last year, ASML revealed that it had become aware that a Chinese company called Dongfang Jingyuan Electron had, through a US “sister” company, Xtal, stolen critical information from ASML. The loot ? More than two million lines of key software code that the two companies have shared. A legal proceeding took place behind closed doors in 2018 where US investigators managed to establish that Xtal and Dongfang had acted for one purpose: to get their hands on ASML technologies to transfer them to China. And who is Dongfang Jingyuan? One of the technological gems of the Chinese semiconductor industry. Which is already developing key machines for the production of 200/300 mm wafers, such as surface verification tools (metrology), imaging systems, etc. And which is expected by some to launch the first generations of modern steppers/scanners in Chinese industry.
Read also: China poaches Taiwanese semiconductor engineers (March 2021)
After the flaw has been discovered, it is now necessary to know as exactly as possible what has recently been stolen and to see who “will benefit from the crime”. And especially how not only ASML, but above all the “coalition of steppers” represented by the Netherlands, Japan and the United States can respond. In proven cases of espionage, like that of Micron, the West has already reacted fiercely by recalling engineers and machines. Burying just five years ago, a mega factory dedicated to memory manufacturing.
Read also: Will the USA (again) kill a Chinese champion of memory? (December 2022)
But in the case of the leak at ASML, Chinese ambitions seem a step above. Gradually deprived of certain key technologies and equipment, the Middle Kingdom decided to develop them itself. And once this knowledge was acquired, digested and transformed into indigenous machines, China would gain even more autonomy. Even, as she probably wishes, in autarky. Which of course is easier said than done: as powerful as they are, the US sees the chip production chain as a far-reaching cooperation – in Japan and the Netherlands machinery, in Taiwan and Korea mass production in the South, in the USA ISAs and key software, etc. Will China be able to achieve its dream of total independence? It’s quite unlikely. But we can see that she is doing everything to succeed.
Bloomberg
