US report: European firms sell to Chinese military-linked companies

WASHINGTON, United States — A US Congressional committee report released Tuesday said that five major semiconductor equipment manufacturers, including European giant ASML, sold $38 billion worth of critical technology to China in 2024, including to companies flagged as US national security threats.

The House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party found that China now accounts for 39 percent of total revenue for the five leading “toolmakers” — the specialized, highly complex machines needed to produce computer chips.

The report mentioned US companies Applied Materials, KLA Corporation and Lam Research, but said ASML of the Netherlands and Japan’s Tokyo Electron had substantially increased sales to restricted Chinese entities as Washington imposed stricter controls on American companies’ exports.

The investigation revealed that five Chinese companies restricted by Washington for their military ties were among the top 30 customers of all five equipment manufacturers between 2022 and 2024.

These included Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), China’s largest chipmaker, and Yangtze Memory Technologies (YMTC).

“The Toolmakers are selling the forges of future weapons and surveillance tools to the very companies that seek to build (China’s) semiconductor industry into a dominant force,” the report said. (Inquirer.net)