Recently, there was big news, after five years of long litigation, Fujian Jinhua integrated circuit *** ushered in justice, the United States court ruled that Fujian Jinhua did not steal the trade secrets of American chip companies, not guilty.
This is a very long story, and I will give you a detailed explanation.
In 2016, three major memory chip bases were established in China, namely Yangtze River Storage, Changfeng NAND flash memory, Changxin Storage, DRAM memory, and Fujian Jinhua, which focused on DRAM memory.
Fujian Jinhua is cooperating with UMC, entrusting UMC to conduct research and development in the early stage, and the technology is shared by both parties, and then transferred to Jinhua for mass production after the overall technology is completed.
The initial investment plan is more than 20 billion US dollars, divided into three phases, the first phase of 5.3 billion US dollars, put into operation in the third quarter of 2018, with a monthly production capacity of more than 60,000 pieces.
When everything was going smoothly, in September 2017, Micron, an American memory chip company, jumped out, saying that UMC employees had stolen Micron's DRAM trade secrets, which were then used to help Jinhua develop DRAM products.
Why did Micron jump out? This is not difficult to understand, Micron is a global memory chip giant, and its revenue in China accounted for as much as 40%.
Later, Micron sued Fujian Jinhua, claiming that Fujian Jinhua used Micron's technology, and then the United States included Jinhua in the "Entity List" for export control, and later Fujian Jinhua also sued Micron, claiming that Micron infringed.
Later, in November 2018, the U.S. Department of Justice sued Fujian Jinhua and UMC for stealing trade secrets.
Under pressure, UMC pleaded guilty in 2020, backed a $60 million fine, and opted to settle the matter. And in 2021, Micron reached a global settlement with UMC, and UMC took itself out of the two lawsuits.
However, the lawsuit between Micron and Fujian Jinhua has not ended, and the matter of the United States suing Fujian Jinhua has not ended, and it is still ongoing.
Until December 2023, Micron and Fujian Jinhua Global Reconciliation, there is no longer any infringement or dispute between the two parties.
However, the U.S. Department of Justice is still pushing forward with the lawsuit against Fujian Jinhua, after all, their purpose is not only to suppress Fujian Jinhua, but also to suppress the rise of China's science and technology, and want to take this opportunity to block the development of China's science and technology in the name of "protecting American technology".
However, it is obvious that this accusation involving "stealing trade secrets of American companies" has now come to an end, and behind this, I think it also means that the United States has admitted defeat, after all, the inevitable rise of China's memory chips has come, but Micron is in China, and the more mixed it is, the more it can't get mixed up, and it has to admit defeat in exchange for Micron's development in China.
However, no matter what, it is estimated that Micron will not be able to return to the past, and in the Chinese market, it is estimated that it is impossible to return to 40%, after all, domestic memory chips have been developed, and Changcun and Changxin will not be polite to Micron.