AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – The recently retired chief executive of semiconductor equipment maker ASML said in an interview with Dutch broadcaster BNR on Saturday that the dispute between the United States and China over computer chips is ideological, not based on facts and is set to continue.
Wennink left his post in April after a decade at the helm of ASML, which saw it transform into Europe’s largest technology company. Since 2018, the United States has imposed increasing restrictions on what equipment the company can export to China, its second-largest market after Taiwan, citing security concerns. Most recently, the US sought to prevent the company from servicing equipment it has already sold to Chinese customers.
“These kinds of discussions are not conducted on the basis of facts, content, numbers or data, but on the basis of ideology,” Wennink said.
“You can think whatever you want about it, but we are a company where stakeholder interests have to be managed in a balanced way… If ideology directly infiltrates that, I have problems with that.”
He added that the company has had customers and employees in China for 30 years, “so it has commitments as well.”
In a balancing act, Wennink said he lobbied where possible to prevent tighter export restrictions, while also complaining to senior Chinese politicians when he felt the company’s intellectual property was not being respected.
“I think in Washington they may have sometimes thought that Mr. Wennink might be a friend of China,” he said.
“No, I am a friend to my customers, suppliers, employees, and shareholders.”
He predicted that with geopolitical interests at stake, the chip war could take decades to end.
“This will go on for a while,” he said.