A report released on the 7th by a US congressional committee states that five major semiconductor equipment manufacturers, including European giant ASML, sold key technologies worth $38 billion (RM160.1 billion) to China in 2024. Some of the buyers included companies designated by the US as national security threats.
Citing AFP and other foreign media, the US House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party found that China currently accounts for 39% of the total revenue of the world’s five largest 'tool makers.' These tools refer to the specialized, highly sophisticated equipment required to produce computer chips.
The report mentioned US firms Applied Materials, KLA Corporation, and Lam Research, but also said that as Washington imposed stricter export controls on US companies, the Netherlands’ ASML and Japan’s Tokyo Electron have greatly increased sales to restricted Chinese entities.
Last year, Chinese companies bought $38 billion worth of equipment from these five equipment makers, and did not violate relevant laws; this figure represents a sharp increase of 66% compared with 2022, when many export restriction measures were gradually introduced.
The investigation showed that between 2022 and 2024, five Chinese companies restricted by Washington for their military ties ranked among the top 30 customers of each of these five equipment manufacturers. The list includes China’s largest chipmaker SMIC and Yangtze Memory Technologies.
The committee also called on allied countries to expand the ban on the sale of chipmaking equipment to China, rather than imposing limited restrictions targeting specific Chinese chipmakers.
The US is restricting China’s ability to manufacture advanced chips on the grounds of national security, because such chips are crucial for areas like artificial intelligence and military modernization. Both the US and China are competing to export advanced technologies, including AI data centers, to other countries.