Dutch Chip-Equipment Maker ASML Was Victim of Corporate Espionage, Rebuts China Connection -Update

(Updates with second company statement, details on lawsuit)

 
   By Max Bernhard 
 

ASML Holding NV (ASML.AE) said Thursday that one of its U.S. subsidiaries was the victim of corporate espionage several years ago, but denied the incident was connected to the Chinese government.

The Dutch semiconductor-equipment maker said it discovered the theft itself and immediately took legal action. The company was responding to a report by Dutch daily Financieele Dagblad alleging high-level Chinese employees at the company's U.S. unit stole technology, which then ended up with a company linked to the Chinese government.

"The suggestion that we were somehow victim of a national conspiracy is wrong. The facts of the matter are that we were robbed by a handful of our own employees based in Silicon Valley, who had broken the law to enrich themselves," said Chief Executive Peter Wennink, adding that some but not all of the individuals involved happened to be Chinese nationals.

ASML said in an earlier statement that the issue concerned a division that develops software for machine optimization, and that no blueprints for its lithography machines were stolen.

A court case last year found that a company called XTAL was found to have misappropriated ASML's confidential and proprietary information and trade secrets in 2015, and ASML was awarded $223 million in damages. The company said it is unclear to what extend it can collect those damages from now bankrupt XTAL.

On its website, XTAL lists Hong Kong-listed China Oriental Group Company Limited (0581.HK) and Samsung Venture Investment Corporation as its investors.

An ASML spokeswoman said the company never found evidence of any link to the Chinese government, and Mr. Wennink said the event would have no implications for ASML conducting business in China.

In its statement, ASML called the theft an isolated incident. "Can we do business in China? Of course we can. This was one 'bad apple,'" it said.

Write to Max Bernhard at [e-mail]

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(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 11, 2019 09:06 ET (13:06 GMT)

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