US pushes ASML to deny maintenance in China

The Dutch government is said to have started slowing the issuance of licenses for ASML to provide maintenance services to certain lithography machines in China.

Alan Estavez, US undersecretary of commerce for industry and security, will meet with officials and ASML executives in the Netherlands on Monday and raise the servicing contract matter with them, according to a Reuters report.

The report also says the Biden administration may ask ASML to stop selling equipment to a new list of Chinese chip-making factories.

Since last year Washington has been pushing the Dutch government to restrict the maintenance services that are provided by ASML to Chinese customers.

Recent public statements made by Prime Minister Mark Rutte’s administration suggest that the Netherlands will be slow to approve Chinese maintenance requests in the future and quick to deny them, Reuters reported.

Some Chinese commentators said if ASML really stops fixing some of its lithography machines in China, that equipment will become useless once it has any minor problem. They said Chinese chip-makers will have to return the machines to ASML or sell them overseas, resulting in a situation that the Dutch government and ASML do not want to see.

“If ASML cuts its maintenance services in China, will the lithography machines in the country become trash one day? It seems that things have not reached this level yet, because the Netherlands may not satisfy the United States’ request,” a Sichuan-based technology writer using the pen name “Tiaotiao” says in an article.

“A lot of state-owned chipmakers have already said that if they are not allowed to use the lithography equipment they acquired before the US chip export ban took effect, they will send them back