Volunteering to be the "eyes and ears of the U.S. in China"? ASML, the lithography giant, urgently clarifies

After the export of chip equipment to China triggered anger from the U.S. government, Dutch lithography giant ASML reportedly volunteered to be the U.S. "eyes and ears" in China? This astonishing news appears in a new book titled "The World's Most Important Machine."

ASML said today (24th) that the information is false and denied the related reports. It told Observer News that the content of the book is seriously inconsistent with the facts and has damaged the company's reputation. ASML reserves the right to take further actions.

According to a report by the Dutch financial newspaper "Het Financieele Dagblad" on November 20, this new book was co-authored by former Bloomberg journalist Diederik Baazil and Cagan Koc. Based on anonymous sources, the two recorded several key dialogues between the Netherlands, ASML, and the United States in recent years, including an incident that occurred in 2023.

In January of that year, the Netherlands and the United States reached an agreement to further restrict the export of lithography machines to China, which took effect in September of that year and would be fully implemented from 2024. During the months of transition, the U.S. and the Netherlands reached a "gentlemen's agreement": ASML was only allowed to deliver a small number of already signed deep ultraviolet lithography machines (DUV) to China, and the sale of any new equipment was prohibited.

However, the number of machines sold by ASML to China far exceeded the scale agreed upon with the United States, which led to outrage from the U.S.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Raimondo immediately called the then-CEO of ASML, Peter Wennink, and then-Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte also summoned Wennink for questioning.

Rutte warned him that violating the agreement with the United States was putting the Netherlands in a dangerous situation, causing the Dutch government to lose face in front of its key allies.

Rutte also clearly stated that the government had been misled by ASML, and rebuilding American trust was not only a requirement of the U.S. government, but also in the interest of ASML itself.

It is worth noting that Wennink has openly criticized the U.S. ban, arguing that excluding China would only lead China to invest more efforts into independent technological development.

The authors revealed that after being pressured, Wennink proposed an astonishing suggestion: if the U.S. allowed ASML engineers to continue providing services to Chinese customers, the company could provide relevant intelligence about the internal operations of Chinese chip factories to the U.S.

Wennink's idea was that ASML engineers needed to go to the site of equipment deployment to perform maintenance and communicate with local employees, and thus ASML could become Washington's "eyes and ears" in China.

The authors described it as an "unusual" proposal: "A private Dutch company seems willing to provide sensitive information to the U.S. government in exchange for relaxed policy treatment."

However, former U.S. National Security Advisor Sullivan rejected the proposal, stating he did not want to give China an opportunity to fill the gap in the chip manufacturing field.

The book describes that when asked about this matter, an ASML spokesperson said that the company had never made such a proposal to the U.S., calling it an inaccurate description of the event.

In a statement to Observer News, ASML said that it noticed a new book published in Dutch focusing on the company recently attracted media attention. The content of the book is not recognized by ASML.

The statement pointed out that before the publication of the book, we had informed the authors in writing that multiple statements in the book were seriously untrue and harmed ASML's reputation. We reserve the right to take further actions.

Any mention of ASML having ever proposed to "act on behalf of any government" as mentioned in the book is not true and is highly misleading. Similarly, any claims that ASML intended or once intended to violate the agreements of the Netherlands, the U.S., or any other government are also untrue.

The statement concluded by emphasizing that ASML has always complied with all laws and regulations applicable to its business operations and conducts its business within the scope of relevant export control regulations.

Original: www.toutiao.com/article/1849660846991619/

Statement: The article represents the views of the author himself.