EU follows US move to assess China’s dominance of legacy chips

Brussels launches survey to understand its exposure to Chinese semiconductors that power everyday items – from cars to televisions

The bloc plans to compare notes with Washington, which angered Beijing with similar initiative, as they face challenges from ‘non-market economies’

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EU competition chief Margrethe Vestager speaks during a meeting of the EU-US Trade and Technology Council in Leuven, Belgium on Friday. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:14pm, 5 Apr 2024

Amid swirling concerns about China’s dominance of the global market for legacy semiconductors, the European Union and United States are working together to formulate a response.

In the Belgian tech hub of Leuven on Friday, top EU officials said they had launched a survey of businesses on the topic, matching an American initiative that kicked off late last year, and which drew a stern rebuke from Beijing.

“We will do a voluntary survey that we will coordinate [with the US] so that we are addressing some of the same issues in order to be able to compare notes,” the bloc’s competition chief Margrethe Vestager said after the sixth edition of the EU-US Trade and Technology Council (TTC) concluded.

The EU will assess the “trustworthiness” of legacy chips, and the survey could help build a picture of how China’s huge production capacity in the sector could affect European markets.

Increasingly frozen out of Western markets for advanced chips, Beijing is ramping up its production of legacy models that power everyday items ranging from cars to televisions. The chips are also commonly used in the production of most critical goods from planes and medical devices to factory machinery. The disruption in their supply during the pandemic upended global manufacturing.

The survey results will be available in the summer, with Vestager adding that they were basing their approach on the Japanese model of economic security. Researchers from the Stimson Centre have described the model as aimed at “securing the stability and safety of its people and society from attempts by major powers to achieve their political objective”.