One former and two current TSMC employees have been formally charged by Taiwanese prosecutors for violating the country’s National Security Act. According to Nikkei Asia, the trio is accused of stealing details of the company’s 2nm process in an attempt to help Tokyo Electron become more competitive as a supplier of 2nm etching stations to mass produce the foundry’s latest technology.
One of the accused, Mr. Chen, was a former engineer at TSMC who had transferred to Tokyo Electron, said the prosecutors. The latter is a top Japanese firm that supplies chip-making equipment to the former, and it’s alleged that he contacted his co-conspirators, identified by the surnames Wu, Ge, and Liao, to gain insider information on the 2nm process.
