ASML Holding NV and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) have ways to disable the world’s most sophisticated chipmaking machines in the event that China invades Taiwan, people familiar with the matter said.
Officials from the US government have privately expressed concerns to both their Dutch and Taiwanese counterparts about what happens if Chinese aggression escalates into an attack on the nation responsible for producing the vast majority of the world’s advanced semiconductors, two of the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
ASML reassured officials about its ability to remotely disable the machines when the Dutch government met with the company on the threat, two others said.
Photo: ASML / Michel de Heer via Reuters
The Netherlands has run simulations on a possible invasion to better assess the risks, they added.
Spokespeople for ASML, TSMC and the Dutch Ministry for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation declined to comment. Spokespeople for the White House National Security Council, the US Department of Defense and the US Department of Commerce did not respond to e-mailed requests for comment.
The remote shut-off applies to Netherlands-based ASML’s line of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) machines, for which TSMC is its single biggest client. EUVs harness high-frequency light waves to print the smallest microchip transistors in existence — creating chips that have artificial intelligence uses as well as more sensitive military applications.
About the size of a city bus, an EUV requires regular servicing and updates. As part of that, ASML can remotely force a shut-off which would act as a kill switch, the people said.
The Veldhoven-based company is the world’s only manufacturer of the machines, which sell for more than 200 million euros (US$217 million) apiece.
ASML’s technology has long been subject to government interventions aimed at preventing it from falling into the wrong hands. The Netherlands prohibits the company from selling EUV machines to China, for instance, because of US fears they could lend its rival an edge in the global chip dispute.
The EUV machine has helped turn ASML into Europe’s most valuable technology stock with a market capitalization topping US$370 billion — more than double that of its client Intel Corp.
ASML has shipped more than 200 of the machines to clients outside China since they were first developed in 2016, with TSMC snatching up more of them than any other chipmaker.
EUVs require such frequent upkeep that without ASML’s spare parts they quickly stop working, the people said.
On-site maintenance of the EUVs poses a challenge because they are housed in clean rooms that require engineers to wear special suits to avoid contamination.
ASML offers certain customers joint service contracts where they do some of the routine maintenance themselves, allowing clients such as TSMC to access their own machines’ system. ASML says it cannot access its customers’ proprietary data.
TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) hinted in an interview with CNN in September last year that any invader of Taiwan would find his company’s chipmaking machines out of order.
“Nobody can control TSMC by force,” Liu said. “If there is a military invasion you will render TSMC factory non-operable.”
SELL-OFF: Investors expect tariff-driven volatility as the local boarse reopens today, while analysts say government support and solid fundamentals would steady sentiment Local investors are bracing for a sharp market downturn today as the nation’s financial markets resume trading following a two-day closure for national holidays before the weekend, with sentiment rattled by US President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff announcement. Trump’s unveiling of new “reciprocal tariffs” on Wednesday triggered a sell-off in global markets, with the FTSE Taiwan Index Futures — a benchmark for Taiwanese equities traded in Singapore — tumbling 9.2 percent over the past two sessions. Meanwhile, the American depositary receipts (ADRs) of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the most heavily weighted stock on the TAIEX, plunged 13.8 percent in
A wave of stop-loss selling and panic selling hit Taiwan's stock market at its opening today, with the weighted index plunging 2,086 points — a drop of more than 9.7 percent — marking the largest intraday point and percentage loss on record. The index bottomed out at 19,212.02, while futures were locked limit-down, with more than 1,000 stocks hitting their daily drop limit. Three heavyweight stocks — Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (Foxconn, 鴻海精密) and MediaTek (聯發科) — hit their limit-down prices as soon as the market opened, falling to NT$848 (US$25.54), NT$138.5 and NT$1,295 respectively. TSMC's
ASML Holding NV, the sole producer of the most advanced machines used in semiconductor manufacturing, said geopolitical tensions are harming innovation a day after US President Donald Trump levied massive tariffs that promise to disrupt trade flows across the entire world. “Our industry has been built basically on the ability of people to work together, to innovate together,” ASML chief executive officer Christophe Fouquet said in a recorded message at a Thursday industry event in the Netherlands. Export controls and increasing geopolitical tensions challenge that collaboration, he said, without specifically addressing the new US tariffs. Tech executives in the EU, which is
In a small town in Paraguay, a showdown is brewing between traditional producers of yerba mate, a bitter herbal tea popular across South America, and miners of a shinier treasure: gold. A rush for the precious metal is pitting mate growers and indigenous groups against the expanding operations of small-scale miners who, until recently, were their neighbors, not nemeses. “They [the miners] have destroyed everything... The canals, springs, swamps,” said Vidal Britez, president of the Yerba Mate Producers’ Association of the town of Paso Yobai, about 210km east of capital Asuncion. “You can see the pollution from the dead fish.
RSS