Washington is eyeing another chokehold on China’s chip ambitions.
US lawmakers are moving toward banning exports of critical ASML deep-ultraviolet lithography equipment, aiming straight at the kit used by Chinese fabs.
China has been living with US export restrictions for ages, and the big hit came when EUV tools were blocked via the Netherlands and ASML. Beijing has tried to patch together a domestic supply chain, but it has struggled to climb the process ladder, which is why, “officially,” China is limited to 5nm.
A press release from the foreign relations committee says lawmakers are lining up the MATCH Act, which would ban the export of DUV equipment. That matters because DUV lithography is the only practical option for most Chinese fabs trying to push anything half modern.
Huawei, SMIC and Hua Hong lean on DUV for their foundry work, while memory players CXMT and YMTC use it to scale capacity. SMIC is using ASML DUV kit for its N+1 and N+2 7nm-class processes via multi-patterning, which is a fancy way of saying it is doing things the hard way.
US Senate Senator Jim Risch said, “This bipartisan legislation modernises US export controls to ensure adversaries cannot buy ‘chokepoint’ semiconductor manufacturing equipment (SME) technology from the United States or our partners that they cannot build themselves.
By promoting harmonisation of export controls among allies and closing servicing and entity-specific loopholes, the MATCH Act preserves the US technological lead in the AI competition with China.”
The MATCH Act targets the “sale or servicing” of DUV immersion technology, justifying this by claiming the equipment is being used to modernise China’s military tech. It would push major Chinese DUV users into restrictions similar to those under the Entity Act, cutting them off from foreign markets.
It is still being discussed and has not been signed into law, but it reads like lawmakers have decided DUV is the next lever. That would sting because Chinese buyers have been expected to ramp DUV purchases as CXMT and YMTC throw cash at new production lines.
ASML’s reporting shows China accounted for almost 20 per cent of total revenue, driven entirely by DUV lithography sales. If the MATCH Act becomes law, the Dutch firm could find one of its biggest markets suddenly slammed shut.
China has tried to build in-house lithography tools, but those efforts have largely been stuck at mature nodes such as 28nm. For anything nearer 7nm, it is still heavily reliant on ASML, and Washington knows exactly where to press.
