The ministry of economic affairs intervened out of a fear that crucial technological skills and capacities will leave the Netherlands and Europe. The ministry stated in a press release[1] that there was a threat of a "knowledge leak" (w/e that means exactly) and a possible threat to the European economy.
After this intervention the Dutch government can now stop or reverse decisions within the company. That's only allowed if those decisions are harmful to the interests of the company, or for the future of the company as a Dutch or European business, or to the retaining of this crucial value chain for europe.
The company can appeal this decision in court.
For context, the law that allows this all to happen was passed in 1952 and has never before been used. As much as I think our government is currently ran by a bunch of nincompoops, I am inclined to believe that something quite significant was about to happen for this law to get invoked. What exactly that was can for now only be speculated about.
I can recommend you run google translate (or equivalent) on the press release. It's as close as you can get to the source of this news for now. I can only imagine the government is going to be having plenty of debates on the topic coming up, seeing as this is a very rare use of a very heavy-handed tool.
Everybody is a fan of free access and capital markets, until a foreign entity purchases something of importance.
It’s a continuation of recent trends and closing markets.
Nobody in their sane mind would allow a company like ASML or the likes to be purchased by competitors.
But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose.
That's rich, coming from a country which outright bands foreign corporations from even operating within their borders, and those who they allow have to operate through a state-controlled corporate minder.
That has happened and not a lot came of it. Venezuela nationalized American oil projects under Hugo Chavez. If by hell breaking loose you mean law suits I guess so.
> But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose.
As far as I understand, Samsung, TSMC, and SMIC are all closely guarded by their respective governments. And China doesn't (didn't?) allow foreign companies to operate in China without a local partner at all. So I don't see the irony - everyone practices protectionism, some are just more subtle about it than others. Some China-specific examples:
As with most countries, China has adopted some policies aimed at protecting or promoting its domestic industries, including targeted quotas, subsidies to certain key industries and rejection of patents in critical industries. - https://www.rfa.org/english/news/afcl/fact-check-china-prote...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Made_in_China_2025 - government plan with securing first local, and the global key markets, for indigenous firms, the acquisition of foreign technology companies, and independence from foreign suppliers, as explicit goals.
I said it that way because I don’t like the hypocrisies in general, and I said European because the comment I responded to combined Dutch and European markets into one.
It would be foolish to sell off a great value like ASML or others that adds incredible value. But one should also not get mad when other countries do it, because they see their industries as valuable things as well.
Our markets are just getting more closed and different groups are being formed. Let’s hope other high value companies gather their IP rights as well.
> It would be foolish to sell off a great value like ASML or others that adds incredible value. But one should also not get mad when other countries do it, because they see their industries as valuable things as well.
This reads like a straw man argument. No one gets mad when other countries do it. At most, you see complains of protectionism being unilaterally imposed while benefitting from your competitor's openness. See for example the criticism directed at the likes of China for preventing foreign companies from even investing in their domestic market without a government-minder-as-a-partner scheme, while China throws a tantrum when there is even a hint of suggestion that Chinese companies should be subjected to the same type of treatment when operating abroad. See the case of TikTok, for example.
China never claimed it's markets were free to enter by foreigners. US/EU did.
If tit-for-tat is our policy, then we should at least be upfront about it and enshrine it in law, instead of using some ancient law to slap China with: that's arbitrariness.
That answer is American propaganda, Teslas (especially earlier ones) are famous for their crappy build quality. Tesla would be nothing without the Elon hypetrain.
Chinese Teslas had higher standards early on, panels aligned and such.
They are controlled by their respective governments, but realistically that power is limited, because they know that "Western" powers would wage war if necessary. So in reality there is a tacit understanding between corrupt local governments and foreign powers to keep access more or less free.
> because they know that "Western" powers would wage war if necessary.
Why do you feel the need go single out "the west"? I mean, where do you think the container ships crossing the Suez go to and come from? Do you think that the likes of China would be totally ok with their main trade routes being severed and instead having to go all the way around Africa?
You're framing things as if there's still a British empire syphoning the economies of their colonies all the way from Great Britain, with no one else involved or committed to any trade whatsoever.
What about them? The claim, or rather implication, was that Western powers would never allow equivalent protectionist policies, such as preventing the export of key industries and skills, to be enacted by other countries. Yet such protectionism is routine in China (and many other Asian countries), and "whole hell" did not break loose.
A few more than half century old examples don't change what we can all see is the case in the present day.
>The British, French, and Israelis literally went to war against Egypt over the Suez.
The British and the French were concerned about the Suez, but Israel was not dependent on the Suez and went to war over their navigation being blockaded by Egypt in the Gulf of Aqaba and the Straits of Tiran, which was a violation by Egypt of maritime law. Aqaba is in the Sinai peninsula which is also bounded by the Suez.
> The British, French and Israelis literally went to war against Egypt over the Suez.
> They only backed up when the US told the Brits and France they would tank their economies still on US life support.
But they did back off. The US was willing to stand up for Egyptian sovereignty even against their own allies. That isn't an example of non-western countries being unable to enact protectionist policies, it's an example of the opposite.
It looks like that to do it, first, you need to have some atomic bombs.
But talking seriously, the OP didn't say that other countries never do it. Just that the powers have innumerable examples of coups to knock out governments that do this. A lot of them were democratic and popular governments.
Sure but can we just all drop the pretense that sovereignty and property rights mean anything. The only thing that really matters is power and how you get it. You can do protectionism if you are powerful, you can take whatever you want if you are powerful, etc etc.
"The strong do what they can, the weak suffer what they must" has been written down as geopolitical reality by Thucydides around ~400BC [1].
For some reason, over the past few decades the powerful countries from the West employed rhetoric to suggest that their actions are guided by principles and morals. That was most likely a reaction to a huge wave of anti-colonial revolutions and national liberation struggles that tore the Western empires apart. However, USA and Israel have taken off the mask over the past 2 years, and that weasly rhetoric is now over.
> And China doesn't (didn't?) allow foreign companies to operate in China without a local partner at all. So I don't see the irony - everyone practices protectionism, some are just more subtle about it than others.
And the west always said that China is bad for doing it.
> And the west always said that China is bad for doing it.
"The west" criticizes China because the ruling regime imposes a series of arbitrary restrictions to foreign companies, including outright banning them, while demanding that Chinese companies should have unrestricted access to foreign markets.
You are now faced with an exceptionally rare event where a member of "the west" enforces restrictions that are similar to the ones China broadly imposes on foreign companies, but does so on an isolated incident. And you call that irony.
> and that action is perfectly fine. But it is then hypocritic to claim one is more justified than the other
Not really. Everyone was extending courtesies to China, but China opted to unilaterally reject the notion thay others could receive the same benefits they were enjoying. Now you're seeing this sort of courtesies being pulled for the first time. And you opt to frame this as hipocricy?
> But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose.
Russia has nationalised a number of Western companies since 2022, even McDonalds.
Of course the preferred option is what the Chinese do which is to never let that happen in the first place or if you do allow foreign investment always keep a 50.1% stake in the entity and exfiltrate any tech from the venture you need .
I’m not very familiar with Dutch company structure but after a certain percentage you’re usually privy to trade secrets etc. so it’s dangerous even then.
And my point has nothing to do with Chinese or Dutch or European, even though those are the examples I used.
The main thing is that it was a mistake to sell vital industries, and some people are really hypocritical when other countries do something like this, but in this particular case they’re finding out reasons to side with the Dutch government. I just want consistency, it is seldomly okay to allow any other entity into critical industries.
I think it depends on how many gloves are taken off. China in its position would want to sustain global trade and actually more and more respect the current international order, if there is any.
But I don't think the other players want that order to live forever, so we will see. I just hope we don't get WW3, and that's good enough for me.
The coke recipe has never been patented, afaik, and similarly certain high-end things were patented only because the main company was hiring a subcontractor to do something. For example, Samsung flat out copied iPhone exactly almost.
So, my thinking is that there could be less patents, because they’re less likely to share the technology and patents might let others copy stuff.
It gets a lot less contradictory when you realize the principles are window dressing for the interests.
Early America had no regard for intellectual property rights because all the good media came from abroad - then we built Hollywood and saw the light. The west pushes deregulation and free trade because we've got the money and the only thing that can keep us from sucking a market dry is government intervention. The Dutch just seized a company because a geopolitical opponent was using it to exercise leverage, which is also how TikTok became a sub-brand of Oracle.
Nation states will use whatever words are necessary to justify their actions, but the game is and always has been power, leverage, and interest. Given the rise of China, I'm guessing we're going to get a lot more opportunities to tut and shake our heads about how hypocritical western governments turn out to be with regards to national economic interests.
(And, to be clear, I'm not saying this is like it's a good thing. I'm not a government, I'm a person, so all I get is the pointy end of all this happy rhetoric.)
> It gets a lot less contradictory when you realize the principles are window dressing for the interests.
I don't think this is the epiphany you think it represents. The whole point of laws and regulations is to protect interests.
Do you think that any regime passes and enforces laws that are detrimental to their best interests?
In free market economies, laws and regulations are put in place to foster competition, and antitrust legislation is in place to prevent anticompetitive practices. However, laws and regulations are also in place to prevent strategic interests from being captured or even threatened. The motivation is rather obvious and to the point. Where is this window dressing you speak of?
> Nation states will use whatever words are necessary to justify their actions, but the game is and always has been power, leverage, and interest.
Your post shows some degree of confusion, specially by the way you imply inconsistencies. There are none, and the whole point is rather on the nose. Internal competition and level playing fields are promoted as they pressure companies to improve their competitiveness. "Competitiveness" is the operating principle. Having a rival third-party perform an action that threatens your competitiveness is obviously not acceptable.
I think the issue is more complex than that but certainly vested interests / national interest is definitely one aspect of things.
The west and the US specifically has operated on an open market policy partly as a result of two world wars we got dragged into in relatively short order. Economic integration was thought to reduce the likelihood of another great war.
However what we have currently is a relatively developed economy (China) using currency manipulation and protective policies to prop up their own economy long after it has passed out of the "developing" phase. Plus massive and ongoing state investment and debt deferral. China effectively subsidizes massive amounts of economic activity that makes any US or EU tax breaks / protective policies look like chump change.
When you have such a large market participant behaving that way it is little wonder that people lose their faith in free markets and want to intervene. Including doing explicitly punitive things against China. It is an attitude of China's own making. After all... China will not allow you to buy a freakin' popsicle stand as a foreigner let alone a shipbuilding company or anything else.
China wants all the access to the rest of the world and wants everyone to buy their products... but they do not want to reciprocate.
That’s not quite correct. It wasn’t the foreign entity purchasing something, or they wouldn’t have allowed all the foreign entities purchasing things. It is more accurate to say they didn’t care as long as they thought they had the advantage and letting the foreign entity buy critically important companies and industries was a means for grooming them or working them to serve your interests. What “America” has realized is that their plan to develop China into an asset/ally simply did not work, nor that they’ve totally empowered them and likely the Chinese were intentionally sharing false data to give false understanding of how they were doing overall.
We’ve recently seen a major reversal on China in particular, because it has dawned on people they were being played, not that they were the player.
It's not a "free market" to allow a foreign communist country to own or control your companies or resources, whether strategic or not. The entire arrangement is governed by diplomacy between two states. FWIW, it never has been the case that everyone was a fan of "the world is flat" theory of capital and labor markets.
>But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose."
We live in a "Rules Based Order" - one rule for thee, another one for me.
This has always been the case, to some degree, but I think it will be a much bigger factor now that so many have accepted that Neoliberalism is dead and no longer give it lip service.
The argument I have heard about the US taking 20% stake in Intel is that when a company asks for federal money then it’s only fair if the federal government gets some equity in return.
> argument I have heard about the US taking 20% stake in Intel is that when a company asks for federal money then it’s only fair if the federal government gets some equity in return
Great forward-looking concept. Terrible ex post facto. The precedent set is that the government can demand equity for past favours at any time.
Also, now that the U.S. owns a stake in Intel, where does that leave competitors? We're already seeing a push to force AMD and Intel to merge [1].
We kept doing this, a bank or company stretches too much after making record profits, and then cries for federal funding and free money.
The federal reserve is a lender of last resort and they shouldn’t have given that much money without any collateral etc. Even if they just kept the stock and then sold it afterwards, we wouldn’t be in this much debt. We spend trillions covering private losses, this was plain stupid.
easiest way to get downvoted on HN is to point out that we are the largest socialist country on the planet exactly because of this. there isn’t any shit we won’t socialize losses on (farming, banking… you name it, US has got your back)
Socializing is not the same as socialist per se, the latter of which has the specific definition of workers controlling the means of production, and I don't see that anywhere in the US much less the world.
you can throw any semantics at this you want and re-define it however you see fit. but there are few things more socialist than government taking a stake in companies. if this Intel story came out or Venezuela or China we would be crying a foul saying “oh look at that socialist shit, glad I live in America”
Sure, I don't disagree on the argument, I'm just saying that people have been using the word socialism wrong for so long that it now just means when the government does something, basically.
The Chinese heavily subsidize their companies and have large government bureaus that strategically guide industries over long time frames. For example, the CCP has been on a long, intentional path to destroying all international solar manufacturers via subsidies, dumping, etc.
You are right. China does not really implement free market without government interaction. Then again, neither does the US or any other country for that matter.
The US used its massive state surveillance apparel to spy on essentially every country in the world, not only for diplomatic advantage, which you might argue would be fair game, but also to steal industrial secrets and promote US companies (see e.g. https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/290615/revealed-m... for France, one of their supposed allies).
Paraphrasing you:
> The US heavily subsidize their companies and have large government bureaus that strategically guide industries over long time frames. For example, the US has been on a long, intentional path to destroying all international corn producers via subsidies, dumping, etc.
The US essentially destroyed the traditional crop growing in Mexico by a combination of subsidies and free trade agreements.
It is _true_ that China does not play a fair free trade game. It is _not true_ that the US, or any other country, does. (The reasons for it should be obvious btw, free trade only works if legislation is more or less the same everywhere, otherwise it's just stupid.)
"Dumping" (selling at an artificially low price) is widely considered an attack on economic activity of the competitors, even though it may spur the economic activity of the consumers of the products being dumped.
In this regard, the Chinese government pouring large subsidies into solar panel production both spurred the economic activity around installing solar panels, and attacked / thwarted in around production of the panels themselves, if the production happens outside China. Only the US was able to somehow develop solar panel production.
I'm not really disagreeing with you as it's not like there is a 100% true definition of a free market, different people can have different conceptions, but the original Adam Smith / classical view is that a free market should essentially be 100% driven by the private market on supply and demand - with as little government intervention as possible on either side of the ledger (subsidy or blocking)
Except it isn't at all. The properties to buy all have a fixed price, costs of houses/hotels are fixed, rents are fixed and can't be adjusted, and most importantly, a) you can only buy a property if you randomly happen to land on it and b) people have no choice of what property to stay at (again, chosen by random dice)
Corporate internal markets are well-known as non-free, and when a sufficiently large company is picking and choosing winners in a national economy that's also not a free market.
I think this concept is an exercise in fantasy. There’s simply no such thing as a free market. Why we single out subsidy as non free is arbitrary. What activities constitute legitimate free market behavior? There’s no actual logically sound distinction. The real distinction is “what we do is free market and what our opponents do is not”
I'm not here to debate whether free markets are good or bad, but governments have a privileged position versus private companies, and effectively operate above the law (again at least compared to private companies). Any government intervention takes us away from a free market, either a little bit or a lot, depending on the action. Apple is a private company. Anything it does is really part of the free market, at least in the original meaning of that as described by Adam Smith and co.
We’re talking about China subsidizing goods that it sells in another country. This is bread and butter “free market” behavior. Literally every company in the world does this one way or another.
My friend, what is so special about the government? If a company uses its massive profits in one area to crus competition by selling at a loss in another area, this is the free market, and when a government does it it is something else? I think you have not thought this through
Private companies do things to maximize profits. They might lose money on some stuff to make more on other things, and there might be some gunk in the system but they are almost all laser focused on making bigger profits.
Governments have lots of other incentives (like job creation, elections, income distribution)
Well, Apple and Chinese government are one and the same when it comes to spending billions to further their agenda, that’s why that wasn’t a good example.
Yes, they do favor their own companies and provide subsidies etc. that’s not the problem though, the problem is that they’re undercutting other companies by selling below cost thanks to those subsidies. Otherwise, we would have to call our farming subsidies the same.
I was originally trying to point out that it has always been important to keep your vital industries secure, it was very stupid of Intel and others to transfer so much technology abroad (to anyone) just to increase their margins, I think ASML did the best: You can purchase our machine, but that’s pretty much it.
> For context, the law that allows this all to happen was passed in 1952 and has never before been used.
Interesting parallel here with China recently invoking - for the first time - their own legislation from the 50's to ban rare earth exports for military uses.
How can you say what the minerals were actually used for though is the question I always have in these types of situations. There are multiple uses of the minerals. Since I've now gotten a literal boat load of the minerals from you, I can use those minerals on other things which now frees up my personal source of minerals on the things you didn't want them used in. In the spirit of the agreement, I'm in full compliance all while achieving the thing you didn't want me to achieve. It's nothing but Pilate washing his hands
Are you tracking that harvesting REM is a nasty business with a lot of “don’t look” environmental impacts? As such, most countries don’t do it, or have an infrastructure for it.
I've seen US numbers along 70-80% is imported. That leaves 20-30% domestic. Some of the REEs are 100% imported, so that's a different issue. But you seem to be implying that the US is 100% importing all REEs with no domestic production at all. That's not true. Yes, some production is slowed due to environmental issues. Some of it is a different nature along the lines of "why mine yours when you can buy someone else's". You keep yours in the ground until you have to get it. You have some small production just to keep the know-how, but you keep the stove down to a simmer from a boil.
> Some of it is a different nature along the lines of "why mine yours when you can buy someone else's". You keep yours in the ground until you have to get it.
My understanding is that a large part of the issue is processing capacity/ability - not mining of the ore. In fact, a significant amount of ore mined in the US is sent to China for processing. I don't think it's a simple case of the US standing up some processing plants in 1-2 years. If that were the case, wouldn't you think it would've happened by now? Is US leadership that bad that they failed to address this risk? Or - more likely - is it because solving the issue will take a lot more than some quick investment?
This is a huge issue for the US MIC. Plans (e.g. with regard to Iran) are going back to the drawing board for sure.
> Is US leadership that bad that they failed to address this risk?
I mean, quite obviously? Borne by the simple fact of... here we are discussing it?
It doesn't matter how easy, quick, or hard it is right now. What matters is leadership is so bad it was allowed to reach this point to begin with, and even a decade ago it was immediately obvious that it was a giant vulnerability that has not even started on beyond corrected in any meaningful way.
Uneducated conclusions like seeing 70-80% being imported means losing access to the exporters would be devastating? Seeing those numbers shows exactly how far away the US is from being self reliant? See how it means that the US is in a weak negotiating position, and that any bolstering from the orange man is pure bullshit? Please, enlighten me where these uneducated conclusions are wrong.
I really cannot tell if this is sarcasm (seems not?) or trolling (sounds like it).
How are we reminding China that the US is a big dog? By imposing tariffs? By demonstrating our ability to do work domestically that they believe us unwilling or incapable of doing?
What does this even mean, to be a big dog in the modern world? It seems more like a large ship listing to one side … if it collapses there will be a lot of small ships damaged in the wake.
Remember, Mommy,
I'm off to get a Commie,
So send me a salami,
And try to smile somehow.
I'll look for you when the war is over ---
An hour and a half from now
I always wondered how the large unified world of Roman Empire with running water and sewer fell apart (and backwards) into multitude of small feudal pieces with no technology to speak of for the 1000 years after Roman Empire. I think our modern civilization is probably at the beginning of similar process.
"In 1984, a German historian compiled 210 explanations historians had suggested for Rome’s fall, from lead poisoning and barbarian invasions to Christianity, moral decline and gout.
After studying dynamic civilizations such as Athens, Rome, Abbasid Baghdad, Song China, Renaissance Italy and the Dutch Republic, I can attest that there is no single explanation. Each golden age had its own character and its own downfall."
I always figured it was a combination of the volcanic winter of 536[1] and the Justinianic plague[2] (which happened right as the eastern roman empire was reconquering the western empire to reunify).
As I understand it, the Roman Empire was fuelled by expansion (stealing other people stuff), enabled by their exceptional military machine. Once they could not profitably expand any further, they were in trouble.
I lived in USSR, and know first hand that it means to be separated from common technological space. USSR wasn't that small, especially if one adds Eastern Block, yet it was falling behind the world becoming fully incapable to produce their own comparable computers, cars, etc.. If world get to split into such islands, the speed of technological progress will fall dramatically while social progress may go fully backwards. If you look at some ideologies rising around the world - they are straight medieval, and in many cases only connectedness to outside world has been preventing them from taking over their "islands".
Adding USSR into the discussion greatly increases complexity of the discussion. From analysis I've read, central planning is supposedly fine when country doesn't have much industry, because to start things up, it can provide essential investments and starts organizing production. But when country is somewhat developed, efficiency starts to matter and top-down approach to decision making of central planning vs bottom-up decision making mechanisms of markets produce different results. Politics and other things are important factors too, but I think that would be too much for this discussion.
As in -- "no technology to speak of" is a gross misrepresentation of the reality of the middle ages. The fact of the matter is, they were strictly more technologically advanced than the classical Romans, with inventions like the heavy plow and three-field rotation improving agricultural productivity significantly beyond what Romans had achieved.
> The fact of the matter is, they were strictly more technologically advanced than the classical Romans
No, they were more advanced in certain ways, but the original contention is correct that they were less advanced in others. Notably they were unable to build domes. They were also less productive, so less advanced in an overall sense.
Charlemagne empire wasn't an interconnected fabric of roads, trade, centralized administration and so forth, ie. it wasn't all that that Roman Empire was, and all that having gone is the fall of Roman Empire. Charlemagne empire was just an aggregation of conquered lands under his personal rule which thus he easily divided between his sons.
I think we are fine in term of infra -- I don't work as a civil engineer, but considering companies in my city repair the roads every year /s they probably retain the knowledge.
How easy is the machinery and tools needed to keep all the infrastructure running? Earth movers are pretty maintainable and barely depreciate. Survey tools though? They have gotten famcy right? Water management has gone quite high tech in some ways. I could see them falling apart kind of like when some hospitals had to revert to paper tape logs. It didn't scale anymore.
Exactly. Building roads and aqueducts were empire-level knowledge skills in Ancient Rome, performed by the army legions. Thankfully they're highly localized skills today.
our knowledge (at least my knowledge of it) is much much smaller that that of Roman Empire, and in particular i don't know whether the fall of that civilization demonstrated the effect of splitting into multitude technologically inferior pieces stagnating for such a long time after that.
That whole REE thing is more of a scare tactic than anything. REEs are really not all that rare, and the current imports of REEs into the US are worth around $200-250M annually. That is millions, not billions. It's actually a laughably small amount.
The main reason that it's mostly China producing them may simply be due to the fact that the volumes are so small that building your own industry is not really worth it.
Strategic REEs, i.e. heavyREE (Dysprosium, Terbium) are infact exceptionally rare, as in GEOLOGICALLY RARE. They are produced in China, because China (and Myanmar deposits controlled by China) are where ionic clays containing strategic HREEs can be economically extracted at scale. It's not just building altenrate HREE (empahsis on H) is not worth it, the technology simply doesn't exist to do so in other geologic deposits, i.e. all the har rock REE US+co has access to. The fact is PRC controls 90% of deposits and 99% percent of processing for elements that enable high temperature magnets, high power sensors, EW aka all the good shit that enables modern military capabilities... which was designed BECAUSE PRC commericialized process on specific geologic deposits that enabled commoditizing those materials. US built their miltary overmatch on material science and dirt that PRC controls and is nearly exclusively geopgraphically bound to PRC, with no short/medium term alternatives. PRC as monopoly supplier has much more complete ability to enforce export controls. This is just MIC specific, there's also stuff like dysprosium for highend capacitators where PRC has functionally 100% control, i.e. less performant alternative materials would effective regress performance by 10-25%, comparable to losing node size.
I really wonder how much rare earth element deposits are not found for want of looking. Not much reason to source them yourselves if the country (China) uses them for products that you're going to buy.
According to this map, China has vastly more. But is there something special about China/Myanmar geologically? I guess being downstream of the Himalayas is something.
The clays are all over the world, the processing to extract the REE's of interest is still intensive regardless.
"According to this map" is essentially meaningless w/out a map specific definition of "reserve".
The terms "reserve", "resource" and their variations are misused outside of technical literature that cites whether they are defined via a JORC or other classification.
The bias toward China in that map likely comes from two notes:
* "proven" reserves - as in tested and estimated to some higher standard, as opposed to "we know there's a lot 'over here' but we haven't spent $X million on a drill assay program yet.
* "controlled or owned" by China - Chinese companies are majority shareholders in joint ventures that source raw materials across the globe (they source concentrates from Australia, from Peru, from elsewhere, in addition to their home soil deposits). This means a number of maps might show all REE deposits owned by Chinese companies as on the books for China (as that is where much of the processing of concentrates occurs).
For interest:
North Stanmore in Western Australia has emerged as one of the world's most extraordinary heavy rare earth element (HREE) deposits, particularly for dysprosium and terbium in North Stanmore. (Sept, 2025)
Dollar value is not the point. For the US MIC this matters a lot. There are not really any ready replacements for some vital weapons components at a time when US weapons stockpiles have been heavily depleted.
The usual solutions - money and violence - are not applicable here. China doesn't need the money and can't be bullied. Sources other than China are not going to cut it in the short and mid term. This is a geopolitical nightmare for the US and deserves more media attention.
> The main reason that it's mostly China producing them may simply be due to the fact that the volumes are so small that building your own industry is not really worth it.
There's also an element of their production generating pollution and us preferring to think of ourselves as cleaner than that. We only use the rare earths.
Compare how desalinization is very cheap, but California prefers constant screaming about drought.
We have a similar law in Italy, but, not having much advanced technology foreigners are willing to buy, the government uses it to prevent foreigners from buying washing machine manufacturers.
I assume this is an entirely independent Chinese company without some Dutch sponsor or something. That conforms to local regulations. But now The Dutch government says "we have this new power over you" and that is that. With the consequence presumably being export control on dutch tech, banning from their market, etc? Or were there any more hooks planted that make it easier to force compliance? For example -- and I assume this is not the case in the Netherlands -- in China there is a 51% ownership of the foreign company by a local company (which is more or less state controlled).
> I assume this is an entirely independent Chinese company without some Dutch sponsor or something.
It's not, it's a Dutch company, formed according to Dutch law, with headquarters in the Netherlands, that was bought by another Chinese company a few years ago.
Dutch law sets rules on how any company, but especially public companies (so-called naamloze vennootschappen) must be governed. Even if you own all the shares, by law you don't have unlimited and unchecked power in the company, you have to abide by governance rules.
Seemingly simultaneously with the government order, a suit was brought to the court enforcing these laws (the Ondernemingskamer) alledging that the CEO and owner were not abiding by them. The court documents are a bit weird to me as a non-lawyer, with Nexperia named as both plaintiff and defendant, so I'm not sure who brought it, but it might've been the government, who are named as a party.
The court agreed that the suit could have merit, and as an interim measure while the legal proceedings play out, has suspended the CEO and named a temporary director. It also suspended the authority of the owners over their shares (except for one), and assigned a trustee to manage them temporarily. The court did not actually rule on the contents of the suit yet, it only issued interim conservatory measures. We'll likely hear more about how the suit plays out over the next few months.
An interesting matter of contention in the suit is that the CEO/owner want the CLO to be suspended, while the other side asks the court to prohibit firing of the CLO. I presume there has been a conflict in the board, either leading to or caused by the government order.
Sounds like the OR (ondernemingsraad) apparently wants to get rid of the CEO for incompetence which is very interesting. It is extremely hard to prove (in a court of law) but a valid reason. I assume they were doing all kind of shady things if they go that route. (Havent read the Court Docs, it is a guess)
OR vs CEO also explains the duplicate entries as they are both representatives of the company.
Nexperia was also spun off to placate Chinese regulators back when Qualcomm wanted to acquire NXP, and then after the spin off the Chinese regulators still refused to approve the acquisition.
And that the two collaborate closely on all kinds of projects, and that NXP (the former owner of the business unit that became Nexperia) and Nexperia (the company that is the focus of this action) are both customers of ASML.
Maybe pressure from the US gov? As a negotiatingtactic vs China - remeber the moves against MotorSich in Ukraine some years back , where the deal was win-win for both but Washington put the kibosh on it and ultimately got destroyed by Russian offensive.
Since the speed/urgency and unusual application of the law as you mention , mean extraodinary actions must have quite extraordinary causes.
In any case still too many unknowns in the story , hopefully clarity ensues soonest.
Believe it or not, but the dutch government has agency. It's not impossible for US pressure to be a factor, but I think it's more likely the management of the company was planning to move production to china or something like that. That'd (rightly!) spook the government into some quick action, especially given the political climate around Russia seemingly not being content with having their war confined to Ukraine.
Unfortunately we seem to be living in interesting times.
The US has immense pressure on the dutch government, given their control over ASML . Its US big tech and semi design studios that determines who will need to buy EUV from ASML. Given ASML is not allowed to do business with China, Russia etc.
You could just add easily argue that the Dutch government has immense leverage over the US, since ASML controls the leading edge fab technology that underpins Nvidia etc. It seems more to me like a highly profitable partnership that neither side can credibly threaten to withdraw from.
Although without any proof, but the Cold War history convinces me that US usually has the better hands when dealing with EU. US has the bigger and better sticks.
Either way, it cannot be stopped, China will develop independent technology sector because they can and they have no other choice. They don't trust the West and cases like this make such attitude understandable.
As soon as China tries to compete with the rich monopolies, the "free market" goes out of the window and becomes "free to do as we tell you".
>As soon as China tries to compete with the rich monopolies, the "free market" goes out of the window and becomes "free to do as we tell you".
When China cannot compete with incumbents those protections also go up and when they can now people like you appeal to free trade (while ignoring existing protections). You are being overly charitable to one side here. Which is it? Free trade or Protectionism?
You're assuming too much and, along with others here, acting like you've been hurt. "Free trade" is the mantra of Western economists and politicians since the time of Adam Smith, and it's been a ruse since then too. Read him.
> When China cannot compete with incumbents those protections also go up.
They do, but not in the erratic manner, levels or timing we're observing here. China is a party of the WTO and they haven't broken any of its agreements, nor have they used any of its emergency clauses.
> You are being overly charitable to one side here. Which is it? Free trade or Protectionism?
It's not either/or. I can tell you a third option that is worse than both of these - it's jumping from one to the other and back in an erratic manner as we are doing it now.
I could tell you something that's better than all of these too but I won't do it. I've been talking about it for many years, primarily as an alternative to free trade and I'm amazed that at this time, nobody seems to be aware of it.
Like, what's the point of pointing out obvious truths over and over again with the same (lack of) result.
Ultimately the Dutch, like for instance the Australians, are a rounding error compared to China and a pawn in a bigger game. At least the Dutch can "hide" behind the EU.
So there will noise but this won't stop China' rise and it won't stop Europe's decline, either.
Germany implemented something similar like this after China took over Kuka (industry leading robotics) and practically build an entire industry of robotics in China after that.
the jobs didn't disappear (yet). they grew from 13.000 in 2014 before midea took over to 15.000 in 2024. maybe they could have grown more in germany if midea hadn't taken over. who knows.
well, the real question is, are those 15.000 employees in germany? and were they in germany before? i just found the number on wikipedia, but now i looked up the 2024 report that says that 4600 are in germany, and 10600 are outside. in the 2014 report it says 4700 are in germany, 4500 rest of europe, 1700 north america, and 1100 elsewhere. so it doesn't look like any jobs were moved.
As long as western companies cannot freely buy companies in China the reverse shouldn't be possible, too.
Business with dictatorships must stop as soon as possible. In fact it should be forbidden. Nothing good comes out of that. I hope we will see more moves like this from democratic governments.
Time to quote one of my favourite lines in the Godfather franchise. Probably totally unrelated.
“We gladly put you at the helm of our little fleet, but our ships must all sail in the same direction. Otherwise, who can say how long your stay with us will last. It's not personal, it's only business. You should know, Godfather”
I couldn’t place this quote, so I googled it and learned it’s from Godfather Part 3. Bold choice to take your favorite quote from that particular movie. :)
Oh lord no. Pacino’s Scream made acting history and is of the finest scenes to come out of the Strasberg acting ecosystem. Critics gonna crit, but there are some remarkably good things about that film.
Godfather 3 is actually my favorite Godfather movie.
It detours from the mafia line of story and instead dives into the darker maelstrom of high politics.
It is from this movie that I learned about Michele Sindona, about Propaganda Due, and in large gained an undying interest in Cold War and geopolitics. Of course I'm just an amateur who only knows English, Mandarin and a bit of French (for Cold War study I'd say all major EU languages are important), and too much source material was buried in history, awaiting for all relevant parties to die so that it has a chance to go into daylight again.
Netherlands AND Holland? Isn't that the same place?
Also: Even while ASML steppers are built in Netherlands, there are a lot of other non-photolithography tools needed to build a fab in addition to the ASML tools.
I don't understand why this suddenly happened (except if asked by the USG in response to the recent scare/reality over rare earths).
The 50% ownership by a sanctioned entity was a reality for a while, and was an issue as soon as the purchase. This didn't change recently. So, this action should have been part of the pre-purchase review (CFIUS in the US...I assume there is an equivalent in China). On the face of it, this all could have been avoided by having a non-sanctioned entity (including another random Chinese company) own enough of the company to get sanctioned entity ownership below 50%.
Definitely US pressure. NL is always eager to get on the good side of the US, even if they get nothing in return. For example participation in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and Gaza today.
Which came from the US sanctioning Huawei because Huawei was making better chips than Qualcomm and Cisco.
US was posturing to ban China access to Arm. Ultimately, it led to a ban on using TSMC for Chinese companies instead. There is no real justification to do a blanket ban on all Chinese companies except a state-sponsored way to to slow China down in AI race.
When you run your business in China, China runs the copy of your business for you ;)
I do understand that we want to try to see "the same" in the stupidity of our politicians that let all of this happen just like that for many years, but we are different.
The Arm China CEO went rogue and spun it off as its own company. ARM HQ were unable to fire him, as he had physical possession of the company's seal stamp. Reading between the lines, the Chinese government chose not to intervene for multiple years.
This stuff constantly happens to foreigners in China and just seems to be mostly due to having bad local legal teams. If your CEO can run off with the company stamps and screw you over.. then it just sounds like amateur hour and you have no idea what you're doing.
The legal system there is fundamentally very bureaucratic - there are rules, but they're very different from the West. You need local help - and a lot of it. You see similar bureaucratic insanity in Japan, though I'm guessing there is just a lot more legal infrastructure for guiding foreign companies there.
I smell a loose loose situation ahead. Nexperia will have problems sourcing there materials in the future and Europe will sit on a husk of the former company. China is not unheard of starving things they do not benefit from
I'm currently blazing through "Chip War" and can't put it down. This news is fascinating in that context. I highly recommend the book to anyone who hasn't read it.
I read it recently. I thought it was going to be a bit dry and heavy going. But it was a really good read.
TIL Shockley, one of the original pioneers of semi-conductors and Nobel prize winner, was a total shit. His staff hated him so much that the key players left and started a new company (Fairchild). He later became a eugenics crank.
I'm not seeing any mention of the Entity List ITT, which seems like the real reason. Via SCMP:
>Some analysts said the move by the Dutch ministry resulted from a new rule issued by the US Bureau of Industry and Security, the agency responsible for export control policies. The rule, effective September 29, imposed new restrictions on entities which are at least 50 per cent owned by enterprises on the Entity List or the Military End-User List – two blacklists issued by the US government.
Nexperia was formed because back in 2017 (if I remember correctly) Qualcomm wanted to buy NXP. So NXP wanted to look more attractive to Qualcomm shareholders and sold its more low-tech business unit to Chinese investors. That acquisition didn't go through because of the tensions between US and China during the first Trump admin.
NXP has been trimming fat since its formation from Philips Semiconductors and American or Chinese companies are buying whatever business unit they can grab. They pretty much buy it for the IP and the customers. Once they get the IP they usually fore the whole team and shut dient operations in NL.
Nexperia wasn't doing this though. They had no interesting technology to steal oe transfer to China to begin with.
> NXP has been trimming fat since its formation from Philips Semiconductors
Honestly it appears to me that Philips themselves have just been losing talent/marketshare/I'm not even sure what, causing their gradual decline. The Philips I grew up with was an electronics powerhouse. Today apart, from their healthcare department (and maybe their slightly overpriced lighting department via Signifify), they don't seem to be very "active", and that makes me sad.
That will not happen. But yes, you are right that this decision was not taken lightly, I've only heard of one other such move in the last 50 years or so.
The Chinese propaganda machine is already making lots of waves about how NL is no longer a democracy and how this dings NL reputation abroad.
The Dutch have put restrictions on Wingtech to not make certain changes (sale or move of assets, intellectual property, company activities, employees) for a year. That should give you enough to chew on I think (and it is public knowledge). Specifically the IP and assets bits are in focus here, more so because the parent company is on a watchlist. Note that they not only kicked out the CEO - which in itself is an earth shaking move for a company this big - they also took control over the shares.
50 years of sending all the knowledge to China and now sudden realization that „data is the value”. Work was cheap, but we paid in IP and tech as a whole.
It’s great to see how long term is China strategy and how well they execute it.
Good luck for us all being „independent”. We can make processors out of attached plastic bottle caps…
The UK used its National Security & Investment Act (2021) to order divestment of Nexperia’s Newport Wafer Fab in Nov 2022. The UK ordered them to sell 86% of the stake due to National Security concerns
They are not being taken over. The Dutch government says it can now reverse or hold back decisions made within the company if they are deemed damaging to the Dutch or European production. I assume the law is written in a way that allows the government to only intervene if it is for such things. A judge would ultimately decide whether it is, if it gets to that point.
Expect more of this to come, it's an unstated goal of the Chinese Communist Party to deindustrialize the West, the UK had to intervene too a few months ago to stop them from destroying their steel producing capacity.
The timing is weird, just after Trump's latest escalation with China. Using The Netherlands to fall into the sword would fit with the general tactics of dumping the Ukraine war on the EU and trying to sour their relations with China.
That way, the U.S. is free to control all oil resources in the Middle East and conquer new ones in Venezuela. The EU gets nothing but enemies and higher oil and gas prices.
In principle I'm against outsourcing or technology transfers to China, but please do it on you own schedule.
> In principle I'm against outsourcing or technology transfers to China, but please do it on you own schedule.
In principle, the tit for tat policy with China should have been initiated 15 years ago. China has restricted its own markets in similar ways since at least that far back, and it was clear then, when they banned Google in 2010, that they were not playing by the same playbook as we were.
The U.S. doesn't control oil in the Middle East, that would be Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Iran, etc, all sovereign nations with their own governments. It also produces more domestically than its own demand and is a net exporter of oil.
Also, not sure why the Ukraine war is the United States responsibility over the EU's responsibility given that its your next-door neighbor and its your eastern flank that would suffer if Ukraine were to fall to Russian control. EU, of course, partly responsible for enriching Russia to the point where it can afford such a war with its own purchases of gas while shuttering nuclear power plants for indescribable reasons.
When I hear "data sovereignty" I usually think of things like transfers to another country, etc. Are you using it to refer to censorship here?
If memory serves, China wanted to censor Google, Google declined (had a redirect to the Hong Kong site for a while), China blocked accessing foreign Google sites. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_China has more.
People like to play the victims, nobody else wanted to buy these unattractive companies back then, but once these companies are turned around or eventually fail, suddenly they are of national importance, we were ripped off.
The Google Facebook examples probably would hold better if the US hadn't axed TikTok, also, Google isn't banned in China, they refused to comply with censorship regulations and left themselves.
Rules only apply when the people that set the rules win, maybe China is to be blamed for seeing through this cruel world earlier.
Great. Absolutely outstanding from the Dutch government, to not let China dominate Europe however it wants.
Securing a Chip industry independent from China, Taiwan and the US has to be the top long term security interest. I only hope that the EU can use it's power to make things like this more feasible and to keep Europe independent from US/Chinese interests.
> Great. Absolutely outstanding from the Dutch government, to not let China dominate Europe however it wants.
Arguably the time to do that was in 2018, they could have blocked Nexperia from being aquired by Wingtech in the first place. But I supposed the second best time is now.
Let's be real here, a European company wouldn't even have been allowed to buy a Chinese company in China and have the level of control as in this case in the first place.
Greed. When China was becoming manufacturing powerhouse, it was incredibly cheap, and Chinese government seemed extremely willing to play ball by making sure there was no government caused slowdowns. This obviously worked until it didn't but even now, it's so expensive to change, corporations are screaming about their quarterly stock price and US being so financialized, US in a real gordian knot.
I never understood this, I believe very strongly in the free market, but only where there is a free market. Of course you can let the free market run free up to the border of e.g. the US but surely it won't solve international trade since many countries do not have a free market. Unless we agree some international rules such that the boundary of the free market "sandbox" becomes the earths borders.
It's why I also think it is possible to hold a pro-free-market pro-tariff position simultaneously without contradiction. Tariffs could be used to "level set" manipulation from foreign governments and make the incoming goods behave as if they were not manipulated (thus also reducing the incentive to manipulate in the first place).
Not sure this is how tariffs are being used in reality.
You are 100% correct. Free Trade hasn't been disproven, only the inane notion that one should pursue unreciproval free trade with a countries that perform mercantalism against them.
The consumer isn't everything, the worker does matter just as much.
>You are 100% correct. Free Trade hasn't been disproven
"nono, that's not REAL communism, that's just dictatorship!"
"nono that's not REAL free trade, it's government intervention!"
"And I Would Have Gotten Away With It Too, If It Weren't For You Meddling Kids!"
Funny how when you get to the two end of the spectrum of economic theories you suddenly get to horseshoe theory of politics.
Maybe in a century or two we will finally see that armchair theories that disregard human nature and builds on simplified models of the world, have its limitations, rather than insisting that unless it haven't been 100% practiced to its Puritan image, it can't be disproven.
Greed sure, but also optics. In the US at least, we love to condemn China for being "communist" and not a real democracy. Remember, for the US, communist has been the number one enemy for a long time. Obviously, we can't do what they do.
But we do what they do, and China isn't even communist.
In China, most locally manufactured brands seem to vanish after roughly two decades — whether in clothing, food, daily necessities, automobiles, or electronics.
Yet, global brands such as Coca-Cola, Nike, Adidas, P&G, Unilever, Colgate, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Audi (collectively known as “BBA” in China), and even Nokia, dominate the market;
Interestingly, many European companies were eventually overtaken by their American counterparts — Nokia for example.
We’re not even talking about computers and smartphones—when it comes to these sectors, the U.S. simply won’t allow anyone else to take the lead. The market is dominated almost entirely by just a few platforms: Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android.
European companies have had massive investments in China for decades now.
Many people in the West have no idea what's going on in China. Western brands and investments are all over the place. Half the cars on the streets used to be European or American (and that has only recently changed, due to the rise of EVs).
Yet Europeans and Americans often complain, "Why can't Western companies operate in China?" Excuse me?
The question was, emphasis mine: "which firms in China are controlled by European entities?"
Western brands have investments, but are required by law to have a local partner, that learns the trade and eventually copies the product:
China bars foreign companies from participating on their own in many industries, but in some of those industries foreign companies can participate only by forming a joint venture with a Chinese partner. [..] Partnering with a Chinese business can be tricky for various reasons, so understanding to what you are agreeing is absolutely critical. This is especially true because the Chinese law, the Chinese government, and the Chinese courts will be heavily biased in favor of your joint venture partner in any dispute between your company and your China joint venture partner’s company. - https://harris-sliwoski.com/chinalawblog/china-joint-venture...
> Half the cars on the streets used to be European or American
And more than half the phones in Europe or America are Asian - what's your point?
That’s a common misconception, but it's factually incorrect. European companies can, and do, acquire and control companies in China.
The legal framework and the reality on the ground show a very different picture.
1. The Law Explicitly Allows It:
China's Foreign Investment Law (effective since Jan 1, 2020) clearly states that foreign investors are permitted to acquire the shares, equity, or other similar interests of domestic Chinese enterprises.
2. The "Negative List" System:
China uses a "Negative List" model. This means any industry not on the list is fully open to foreign investment, often up to 100% ownership. This list has been shrinking every year, opening up more sectors. For instance, all restrictions in the manufacturing sector were removed. While there are still restrictions in very specific strategic areas (like news media or rare earth mining), this is not a blanket ban by any means.
3. Real-World Examples of European-Controlled Companies in China:
You don't have to search hard to find major Chinese operations controlled by European firms. Here are just a few high-profile examples:
Automotive: German automaker BMW raised its stake in its Chinese joint venture, BMW Brilliance Automotive, to 75%. This is a landmark case of a European company taking majority control of a major automotive manufacturer in China. Similarly, Volkswagen owns a 75% stake in its EV-focused Volkswagen Anhui venture.
Chemicals: Germany’s BASF is building a massive new Verbund site in Guangdong. It's a €10 billion project that is 100% owned and operated by BASF.
Retail & Consumer Goods: All IKEA (Sweden) stores in China are operated by its wholly-owned subsidiary. French beauty giant L'Oréal and luxury groups like LVMH and Kering all operate through wholly foreign-owned enterprises in China.
Finance: German insurer Allianz established Allianz (China) Insurance Holding, the very first 100% foreign-owned insurance holding company in the country.
So, the idea that a European company "wouldn't be allowed" to buy a Chinese company is a myth. While the process involves regulations (just like any country), it is legally possible and happens frequently across many industries.
There are many companies which the Chinese government could target in retaliation. In China foreign companies are usually minority partners in some ventures with some Chinese company.
I think its fine to have national and strategic interests. China isn't someone that you can just trust, they are exporting to Russia on the sly and therefore supporting war in Europe because it suits them.
This is a tired talking point. If the EU stopped those imports abruptly they'd blow up their own economies and there would be chaos on the streets.
It is stupid that they put themselves in that position, but they've also greatly reduced their dependency as the war progressed.
With the current trade war and their own domestic troubles, China cannot afford to alienate other foreign markets, hence why this is the prime time to drive concessions against them.
The Euro stance on buying US weapons for Ukraine is probably the most dumbest strategic move or the century. Europe is losing at an alarming rate in many ways. I would be more concerned about the US if I were Europe.
Well clearly clinging free trade while others pursue protectionism/industrial strategy at massive scales against you isn't sustainable.
Is it hypocrisy of you decide to punch back after getting punched? Not really. And China certainly was the much more protectionist than the EU for the three decades.
The title is misleading. The Dutch government says it can now reverse or hold back decisions made within the company if they are deemed damaging to the Dutch or European production. I assume the law is written in a way that allows the government to only intervene if it is for such things. A judge would ultimately decide whether it is, if it gets to that point.
I wouldn't call that "taking control" necessarily. Taking "some" control maybe. But in a reasonable way.
> Wingtech Chairman Zhang Xuezheng had been immediately suspended from his roles as executive director of Nexperia Holdings and nonexecutive director of Nexperia after the ministerial order, according to the filing.
Not sure what firing the boss is, if not taking control...
Some more context from a dutch news source[0]:
The ministry of economic affairs intervened out of a fear that crucial technological skills and capacities will leave the Netherlands and Europe. The ministry stated in a press release[1] that there was a threat of a "knowledge leak" (w/e that means exactly) and a possible threat to the European economy.
After this intervention the Dutch government can now stop or reverse decisions within the company. That's only allowed if those decisions are harmful to the interests of the company, or for the future of the company as a Dutch or European business, or to the retaining of this crucial value chain for europe.
The company can appeal this decision in court.
For context, the law that allows this all to happen was passed in 1952 and has never before been used. As much as I think our government is currently ran by a bunch of nincompoops, I am inclined to believe that something quite significant was about to happen for this law to get invoked. What exactly that was can for now only be speculated about.
I can recommend you run google translate (or equivalent) on the press release. It's as close as you can get to the source of this news for now. I can only imagine the government is going to be having plenty of debates on the topic coming up, seeing as this is a very rare use of a very heavy-handed tool.
[0] https://nos.nl/artikel/2586270-kabinet-grijpt-hard-in-bij-ch...
[1] https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/actueel/nieuws/2025/10/12/wet-b...
Everybody is a fan of free access and capital markets, until a foreign entity purchases something of importance.
It’s a continuation of recent trends and closing markets.
Nobody in their sane mind would allow a company like ASML or the likes to be purchased by competitors.
But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose.
The age of globalism and unfettered free trade is over, and good riddance.
free for me but not for thee
> free for me but not for thee
That's rich, coming from a country which outright bands foreign corporations from even operating within their borders, and those who they allow have to operate through a state-controlled corporate minder.
Too little too late. China will catch up on everything of importance, and we're on the hook for pretty much everything else.
Only they will not admit it.
The capitalist propaganda, "freedom", is so ingrained that we cannot easily paddle back on it. So we will become helplessly hypocritical instead.
That has happened and not a lot came of it. Venezuela nationalized American oil projects under Hugo Chavez. If by hell breaking loose you mean law suits I guess so.
Ah yes, Venezuela famously only has lawsuits that happened to them. Maybe look up Guaido, the 3% polling self and US declared president of Venezuela.
Isn't Venezuela a defacto dictatorship now? Not sure the 3% is correct under these conditions.
They left 3% to the opposition? The government won the general elections in Italy with 98.5% 96 years ago.
And the huge American military force currently positioned off their coastline, blowing up boats!
> But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose.
As far as I understand, Samsung, TSMC, and SMIC are all closely guarded by their respective governments. And China doesn't (didn't?) allow foreign companies to operate in China without a local partner at all. So I don't see the irony - everyone practices protectionism, some are just more subtle about it than others. Some China-specific examples:
tmnvix points out the perfectly analogous Chinese restriction of rare earth exports: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45572420
China imposes more trade and investment barriers, discriminatory taxes, and information security restrictions than any other country by a vast margin. - https://ecipe.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/DTE_China_TWP_R...
As with most countries, China has adopted some policies aimed at protecting or promoting its domestic industries, including targeted quotas, subsidies to certain key industries and rejection of patents in critical industries. - https://www.rfa.org/english/news/afcl/fact-check-china-prote...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Made_in_China_2025 - government plan with securing first local, and the global key markets, for indigenous firms, the acquisition of foreign technology companies, and independence from foreign suppliers, as explicit goals.
I said it that way because I don’t like the hypocrisies in general, and I said European because the comment I responded to combined Dutch and European markets into one.
It would be foolish to sell off a great value like ASML or others that adds incredible value. But one should also not get mad when other countries do it, because they see their industries as valuable things as well.
Our markets are just getting more closed and different groups are being formed. Let’s hope other high value companies gather their IP rights as well.
> It would be foolish to sell off a great value like ASML or others that adds incredible value. But one should also not get mad when other countries do it, because they see their industries as valuable things as well.
This reads like a straw man argument. No one gets mad when other countries do it. At most, you see complains of protectionism being unilaterally imposed while benefitting from your competitor's openness. See for example the criticism directed at the likes of China for preventing foreign companies from even investing in their domestic market without a government-minder-as-a-partner scheme, while China throws a tantrum when there is even a hint of suggestion that Chinese companies should be subjected to the same type of treatment when operating abroad. See the case of TikTok, for example.
China never claimed it's markets were free to enter by foreigners. US/EU did.
If tit-for-tat is our policy, then we should at least be upfront about it and enshrine it in law, instead of using some ancient law to slap China with: that's arbitrariness.
> And China doesn't (didn't?) allow foreign companies to operate in China without a local partner at all
Tesla was the first to buck this trend.
The next question is: why did China give Tesla this unprecedented deal?
The answer I heard at the time was to get local suppliers and workforce up to Tesla standards.
It appears to have worked out for China quite nicely.
That answer is American propaganda, Teslas (especially earlier ones) are famous for their crappy build quality. Tesla would be nothing without the Elon hypetrain.
Chinese Teslas had higher standards early on, panels aligned and such.
Well yeah, they used this playbook with Apple as well.
We do not appear very smart as a country.
Just for cars. Microsoft has been independent in China since the late 90s, although they had to find a partner to do Azure.
> although they had to find a partner to do Azure.
By "finding a partner" you actually mean have Azure-branded services provided by Chinese companies through isolated data centers.
Which kind of proves OPs point.
Do they use the same Microsoft software and the Azure APIs that are available in the rest of the world?
Yeah Asian tigers mostly didn't follow the narrow comparative advantage guidance and instead did state protection of industry to develop it: https://www.amazon.com/Kicking-Away-Ladder-Development-Persp...
The US did the same when it was young, along with large instances of exfiltrating tech (Samuel Slater, kicked off the American industrial revolution).
What about the suez canal or iranian oil fields
They are controlled by their respective governments, but realistically that power is limited, because they know that "Western" powers would wage war if necessary. So in reality there is a tacit understanding between corrupt local governments and foreign powers to keep access more or less free.
> because they know that "Western" powers would wage war if necessary.
Why do you feel the need go single out "the west"? I mean, where do you think the container ships crossing the Suez go to and come from? Do you think that the likes of China would be totally ok with their main trade routes being severed and instead having to go all the way around Africa?
You're framing things as if there's still a British empire syphoning the economies of their colonies all the way from Great Britain, with no one else involved or committed to any trade whatsoever.
Maybe not so much the Brits, but the French still have exploitative relations with their African ex-colonies; look up the CFA franc.
> (...) the CFA franc
Why do you think this is relevant in discussions over who would respond to shutting down the Suez canal? I mean, do you have a map?
What about them? The claim, or rather implication, was that Western powers would never allow equivalent protectionist policies, such as preventing the export of key industries and skills, to be enacted by other countries. Yet such protectionism is routine in China (and many other Asian countries), and "whole hell" did not break loose.
A few more than half century old examples don't change what we can all see is the case in the present day.
The British, French and Israelis literally went to war against Egypt over the Suez.
They only backed up when the US told the Brits and France they would tank their economies still on US life support.
And, pray, why did the Machado win the hypocrisy prize on Friday? Why are American ships outside the waters of Venezuela?
>The British, French, and Israelis literally went to war against Egypt over the Suez.
The British and the French were concerned about the Suez, but Israel was not dependent on the Suez and went to war over their navigation being blockaded by Egypt in the Gulf of Aqaba and the Straits of Tiran, which was a violation by Egypt of maritime law. Aqaba is in the Sinai peninsula which is also bounded by the Suez.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_passage_through_the_Su...
> The British, French and Israelis literally went to war against Egypt over the Suez.
> They only backed up when the US told the Brits and France they would tank their economies still on US life support.
But they did back off. The US was willing to stand up for Egyptian sovereignty even against their own allies. That isn't an example of non-western countries being unable to enact protectionist policies, it's an example of the opposite.
Stand up for Egyptian sovereignty? The U.S. unseated the UK as one of the dominant forces in the region and controlled the Middle East ever since.
I suppose installing el-Sisi is also an example of protecting Egyptian sovereignty:
https://www.cato.org/commentary/ten-years-after-coup-us-stil...
Venezuela has threaten war against their neighbours. Maybe a little bird told their president to do so [1], but still...
[1] https://www.latintimes.com/nicolas-maduro-losing-it-venezuel...
It looks like that to do it, first, you need to have some atomic bombs.
But talking seriously, the OP didn't say that other countries never do it. Just that the powers have innumerable examples of coups to knock out governments that do this. A lot of them were democratic and popular governments.
Sure but can we just all drop the pretense that sovereignty and property rights mean anything. The only thing that really matters is power and how you get it. You can do protectionism if you are powerful, you can take whatever you want if you are powerful, etc etc.
"The strong do what they can, the weak suffer what they must" has been written down as geopolitical reality by Thucydides around ~400BC [1].
For some reason, over the past few decades the powerful countries from the West employed rhetoric to suggest that their actions are guided by principles and morals. That was most likely a reaction to a huge wave of anti-colonial revolutions and national liberation struggles that tore the Western empires apart. However, USA and Israel have taken off the mask over the past 2 years, and that weasly rhetoric is now over.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Melos#Melian_Dialogue
> And China doesn't (didn't?) allow foreign companies to operate in China without a local partner at all. So I don't see the irony - everyone practices protectionism, some are just more subtle about it than others.
And the west always said that China is bad for doing it.
That’s the irony part.
> And the west always said that China is bad for doing it.
"The west" criticizes China because the ruling regime imposes a series of arbitrary restrictions to foreign companies, including outright banning them, while demanding that Chinese companies should have unrestricted access to foreign markets.
You are now faced with an exceptionally rare event where a member of "the west" enforces restrictions that are similar to the ones China broadly imposes on foreign companies, but does so on an isolated incident. And you call that irony.
We‘ll see how rare and isolated this is will be.
Beware of the beginnings.
> We‘ll see how rare and isolated this is will be.
Why do you presume this is bad?
It’s not ironic. The Chinese are engaging in this behaviour, while they have had full access to western markets, arguably detrimental to the west.
So now Europe are doing the same thing.
and that action is perfectly fine. But it is then hypocritic to claim one is more justified than the other
> and that action is perfectly fine. But it is then hypocritic to claim one is more justified than the other
Not really. Everyone was extending courtesies to China, but China opted to unilaterally reject the notion thay others could receive the same benefits they were enjoying. Now you're seeing this sort of courtesies being pulled for the first time. And you opt to frame this as hipocricy?
It’s ironic. China just did it first. I can’t call something wrong and then to the same.
If, for instance, we call out China for surveillance of their citizens and then start doing the same, isn‘t that ironic?
> But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose.
Russia has nationalised a number of Western companies since 2022, even McDonalds.
Nothing happened.
Yeah relations between Russia and the west are famously normal right now.
I have a feeling the function that tell us "if hell breaks loose" has something to do with number of nukes ready and waiting.
Of course the preferred option is what the Chinese do which is to never let that happen in the first place or if you do allow foreign investment always keep a 50.1% stake in the entity and exfiltrate any tech from the venture you need .
I’m not very familiar with Dutch company structure but after a certain percentage you’re usually privy to trade secrets etc. so it’s dangerous even then.
And my point has nothing to do with Chinese or Dutch or European, even though those are the examples I used.
The main thing is that it was a mistake to sell vital industries, and some people are really hypocritical when other countries do something like this, but in this particular case they’re finding out reasons to side with the Dutch government. I just want consistency, it is seldomly okay to allow any other entity into critical industries.
"For my friends, everything; for my enemies, the law."
I wonder how this would affect patent applications, since after such an event, some countries might not respect patents for their internal markets.
I think it depends on how many gloves are taken off. China in its position would want to sustain global trade and actually more and more respect the current international order, if there is any.
But I don't think the other players want that order to live forever, so we will see. I just hope we don't get WW3, and that's good enough for me.
Like… China?
The coke recipe has never been patented, afaik, and similarly certain high-end things were patented only because the main company was hiring a subcontractor to do something. For example, Samsung flat out copied iPhone exactly almost.
So, my thinking is that there could be less patents, because they’re less likely to share the technology and patents might let others copy stuff.
> For example, Samsung flat out copied iPhone exactly almost.
Which iPhone?
The one with the rounded corners, obviously.
"For my friends, the law; for my enemies, arbitrariness."
> Nobody in their sane mind would allow a company like ASML or the likes to be purchased by competitors.
But they did it.
It gets a lot less contradictory when you realize the principles are window dressing for the interests.
Early America had no regard for intellectual property rights because all the good media came from abroad - then we built Hollywood and saw the light. The west pushes deregulation and free trade because we've got the money and the only thing that can keep us from sucking a market dry is government intervention. The Dutch just seized a company because a geopolitical opponent was using it to exercise leverage, which is also how TikTok became a sub-brand of Oracle.
Nation states will use whatever words are necessary to justify their actions, but the game is and always has been power, leverage, and interest. Given the rise of China, I'm guessing we're going to get a lot more opportunities to tut and shake our heads about how hypocritical western governments turn out to be with regards to national economic interests.
(And, to be clear, I'm not saying this is like it's a good thing. I'm not a government, I'm a person, so all I get is the pointy end of all this happy rhetoric.)
> It gets a lot less contradictory when you realize the principles are window dressing for the interests.
I don't think this is the epiphany you think it represents. The whole point of laws and regulations is to protect interests.
Do you think that any regime passes and enforces laws that are detrimental to their best interests?
In free market economies, laws and regulations are put in place to foster competition, and antitrust legislation is in place to prevent anticompetitive practices. However, laws and regulations are also in place to prevent strategic interests from being captured or even threatened. The motivation is rather obvious and to the point. Where is this window dressing you speak of?
> Nation states will use whatever words are necessary to justify their actions, but the game is and always has been power, leverage, and interest.
Your post shows some degree of confusion, specially by the way you imply inconsistencies. There are none, and the whole point is rather on the nose. Internal competition and level playing fields are promoted as they pressure companies to improve their competitiveness. "Competitiveness" is the operating principle. Having a rival third-party perform an action that threatens your competitiveness is obviously not acceptable.
I think the issue is more complex than that but certainly vested interests / national interest is definitely one aspect of things.
The west and the US specifically has operated on an open market policy partly as a result of two world wars we got dragged into in relatively short order. Economic integration was thought to reduce the likelihood of another great war.
However what we have currently is a relatively developed economy (China) using currency manipulation and protective policies to prop up their own economy long after it has passed out of the "developing" phase. Plus massive and ongoing state investment and debt deferral. China effectively subsidizes massive amounts of economic activity that makes any US or EU tax breaks / protective policies look like chump change.
When you have such a large market participant behaving that way it is little wonder that people lose their faith in free markets and want to intervene. Including doing explicitly punitive things against China. It is an attitude of China's own making. After all... China will not allow you to buy a freakin' popsicle stand as a foreigner let alone a shipbuilding company or anything else.
China wants all the access to the rest of the world and wants everyone to buy their products... but they do not want to reciprocate.
That’s not quite correct. It wasn’t the foreign entity purchasing something, or they wouldn’t have allowed all the foreign entities purchasing things. It is more accurate to say they didn’t care as long as they thought they had the advantage and letting the foreign entity buy critically important companies and industries was a means for grooming them or working them to serve your interests. What “America” has realized is that their plan to develop China into an asset/ally simply did not work, nor that they’ve totally empowered them and likely the Chinese were intentionally sharing false data to give false understanding of how they were doing overall.
We’ve recently seen a major reversal on China in particular, because it has dawned on people they were being played, not that they were the player.
It's not a "free market" to allow a foreign communist country to own or control your companies or resources, whether strategic or not. The entire arrangement is governed by diplomacy between two states. FWIW, it never has been the case that everyone was a fan of "the world is flat" theory of capital and labor markets.
Psst, your bias is showing! Tuck it in...
>But the irony is that when a non-European entity were to do something like this, e.g. nationalize their oil or mining etc. industry or a firm, the whole hell would brake loose."
We live in a "Rules Based Order" - one rule for thee, another one for me.
This has always been the case, to some degree, but I think it will be a much bigger factor now that so many have accepted that Neoliberalism is dead and no longer give it lip service.
USA is nationalizng Intel and under this administration more of the commie shit is coming :)
The argument I have heard about the US taking 20% stake in Intel is that when a company asks for federal money then it’s only fair if the federal government gets some equity in return.
You can’t socialize losses and privatize gains.
> argument I have heard about the US taking 20% stake in Intel is that when a company asks for federal money then it’s only fair if the federal government gets some equity in return
Great forward-looking concept. Terrible ex post facto. The precedent set is that the government can demand equity for past favours at any time.
Also, now that the U.S. owns a stake in Intel, where does that leave competitors? We're already seeing a push to force AMD and Intel to merge [1].
[1] https://www.tomsguide.com/tech/us-government-considering-cas...
> You can’t socialize losses and privatize gains.
Yes, yes, and yes.
We kept doing this, a bank or company stretches too much after making record profits, and then cries for federal funding and free money.
The federal reserve is a lender of last resort and they shouldn’t have given that much money without any collateral etc. Even if they just kept the stock and then sold it afterwards, we wouldn’t be in this much debt. We spend trillions covering private losses, this was plain stupid.
> federal reserve is a lender of last resort and they shouldn’t have given that much money without any collateral
The Fed only lends against collateral.
easiest way to get downvoted on HN is to point out that we are the largest socialist country on the planet exactly because of this. there isn’t any shit we won’t socialize losses on (farming, banking… you name it, US has got your back)
Socializing is not the same as socialist per se, the latter of which has the specific definition of workers controlling the means of production, and I don't see that anywhere in the US much less the world.
you can throw any semantics at this you want and re-define it however you see fit. but there are few things more socialist than government taking a stake in companies. if this Intel story came out or Venezuela or China we would be crying a foul saying “oh look at that socialist shit, glad I live in America”
Sure, I don't disagree on the argument, I'm just saying that people have been using the word socialism wrong for so long that it now just means when the government does something, basically.
if we are not a communist country (everyone seems to think that we are not) why the F would we socialize losses?!?
> if we are not a communist country (everyone seems to think that we are not) why the F would we socialize losses?!?
Hold on, the logic is any country that socialises anything to any degree is communist? Where the hell did you get that from?
The Chinese heavily subsidize their companies and have large government bureaus that strategically guide industries over long time frames. For example, the CCP has been on a long, intentional path to destroying all international solar manufacturers via subsidies, dumping, etc.
This is not how free markets function.
You are right. China does not really implement free market without government interaction. Then again, neither does the US or any other country for that matter.
The US used its massive state surveillance apparel to spy on essentially every country in the world, not only for diplomatic advantage, which you might argue would be fair game, but also to steal industrial secrets and promote US companies (see e.g. https://www.mediapart.fr/en/journal/france/290615/revealed-m... for France, one of their supposed allies).
Paraphrasing you:
> The US heavily subsidize their companies and have large government bureaus that strategically guide industries over long time frames. For example, the US has been on a long, intentional path to destroying all international corn producers via subsidies, dumping, etc.
The US essentially destroyed the traditional crop growing in Mexico by a combination of subsidies and free trade agreements.
It is _true_ that China does not play a fair free trade game. It is _not true_ that the US, or any other country, does. (The reasons for it should be obvious btw, free trade only works if legislation is more or less the same everywhere, otherwise it's just stupid.)
A free market just means that people are allowed to buy and sell what they want. If a government decides to help some industries that is irrelevant.
It stops being free when government attacks economic activity, not when it promotes it.
"Dumping" (selling at an artificially low price) is widely considered an attack on economic activity of the competitors, even though it may spur the economic activity of the consumers of the products being dumped.
In this regard, the Chinese government pouring large subsidies into solar panel production both spurred the economic activity around installing solar panels, and attacked / thwarted in around production of the panels themselves, if the production happens outside China. Only the US was able to somehow develop solar panel production.
"attack on economic activity of the competitors"
Thats competition. It is a feature of markets.
not a bug.
Not when its done with the help of a government.
I'm not really disagreeing with you as it's not like there is a 100% true definition of a free market, different people can have different conceptions, but the original Adam Smith / classical view is that a free market should essentially be 100% driven by the private market on supply and demand - with as little government intervention as possible on either side of the ledger (subsidy or blocking)
Monopoly is a free market game and thete is only one winner. Free markets as such is an utopia dream.
Except it isn't at all. The properties to buy all have a fixed price, costs of houses/hotels are fixed, rents are fixed and can't be adjusted, and most importantly, a) you can only buy a property if you randomly happen to land on it and b) people have no choice of what property to stay at (again, chosen by random dice)
mmm by that definition, which market is truly free market again? I'm not sure you can find one tbh
Commodities, large number of buyers and a large number of sellers all buying/selling an equivalent product.
No buyer has power to set prices and no seller does either.
Lol, how is this not a free market? Apple subsidizes dozens of organizations internally to advance its strategic interests, what’s the difference?
Corporate internal markets are well-known as non-free, and when a sufficiently large company is picking and choosing winners in a national economy that's also not a free market.
I think this concept is an exercise in fantasy. There’s simply no such thing as a free market. Why we single out subsidy as non free is arbitrary. What activities constitute legitimate free market behavior? There’s no actual logically sound distinction. The real distinction is “what we do is free market and what our opponents do is not”
I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to spot the difference between Apple and the Chinese government.
I’m not hearing an argument, and I won’t be thinking one up for you. Seems like only a difference of degree to me.
I'm not here to debate whether free markets are good or bad, but governments have a privileged position versus private companies, and effectively operate above the law (again at least compared to private companies). Any government intervention takes us away from a free market, either a little bit or a lot, depending on the action. Apple is a private company. Anything it does is really part of the free market, at least in the original meaning of that as described by Adam Smith and co.
> governments have a privileged position versus private companies, and effectively operate above the law
A lot of private companies effectively operate above the law too! In theory the law can be enforced on them. In practice it often isn't.
We’re talking about China subsidizing goods that it sells in another country. This is bread and butter “free market” behavior. Literally every company in the world does this one way or another.
No, that is not the free market at work at all. I agree it happens however. We simply don't live in a 100% free market world.
I bet you can’t name a single company that doesn’t perform some critical function at a loss.
“subsidising” and “free market” are antonyms we learn in 3rd grade language arts class :)
How about “loss leader”? Ever use napkins at a diner? Buy Costco chicken? I think you are repeating things you were taught but they aren’t true
I guess I have heard it all, the Government is providing napkins at diners and buying up Costco chicken, missed that one in the budget
My friend, what is so special about the government? If a company uses its massive profits in one area to crus competition by selling at a loss in another area, this is the free market, and when a government does it it is something else? I think you have not thought this through
Private companies do things to maximize profits. They might lose money on some stuff to make more on other things, and there might be some gunk in the system but they are almost all laser focused on making bigger profits.
Governments have lots of other incentives (like job creation, elections, income distribution)
Well, Apple and Chinese government are one and the same when it comes to spending billions to further their agenda, that’s why that wasn’t a good example.
Yes, they do favor their own companies and provide subsidies etc. that’s not the problem though, the problem is that they’re undercutting other companies by selling below cost thanks to those subsidies. Otherwise, we would have to call our farming subsidies the same.
I was originally trying to point out that it has always been important to keep your vital industries secure, it was very stupid of Intel and others to transfer so much technology abroad (to anyone) just to increase their margins, I think ASML did the best: You can purchase our machine, but that’s pretty much it.
> For context, the law that allows this all to happen was passed in 1952 and has never before been used.
Interesting parallel here with China recently invoking - for the first time - their own legislation from the 50's to ban rare earth exports for military uses.
Probably not an awesome sign if multiple actors are invoking never-used laws that were created while WWII was still fresh on everyone's mind.
Let’s hope this one is still cold.
s/while WWII was still fresh/the cold war was
Who cares what their legislation says. Xi and ccp can change that at will at anytime.
Netherlands imported more CeO2 (a rare earth) from China than any other country, with 517 metric tons during the first half of 2025.
with Dutch stats like this it’s always important to note what’s for Dutch use or transporting through the Port of Rotterdam.
How can you say what the minerals were actually used for though is the question I always have in these types of situations. There are multiple uses of the minerals. Since I've now gotten a literal boat load of the minerals from you, I can use those minerals on other things which now frees up my personal source of minerals on the things you didn't want them used in. In the spirit of the agreement, I'm in full compliance all while achieving the thing you didn't want me to achieve. It's nothing but Pilate washing his hands
Are you tracking that harvesting REM is a nasty business with a lot of “don’t look” environmental impacts? As such, most countries don’t do it, or have an infrastructure for it.
https://rareearthexchanges.com/best-rare-earth-mining-compan...
Plenty of US companies ready and willing. They've finally gotten an administration that is of like mind on screw the environment and dig dig dig.
US also needs all those factories and machinery to process the stuff.
So, you agree?
Agree with what? What is it that you think is a gotcha here?
Most countries don’t do it, including the US.
“Ready and willing” is quite the turn of phrase.
I've seen US numbers along 70-80% is imported. That leaves 20-30% domestic. Some of the REEs are 100% imported, so that's a different issue. But you seem to be implying that the US is 100% importing all REEs with no domestic production at all. That's not true. Yes, some production is slowed due to environmental issues. Some of it is a different nature along the lines of "why mine yours when you can buy someone else's". You keep yours in the ground until you have to get it. You have some small production just to keep the know-how, but you keep the stove down to a simmer from a boil.
> Some of it is a different nature along the lines of "why mine yours when you can buy someone else's". You keep yours in the ground until you have to get it.
My understanding is that a large part of the issue is processing capacity/ability - not mining of the ore. In fact, a significant amount of ore mined in the US is sent to China for processing. I don't think it's a simple case of the US standing up some processing plants in 1-2 years. If that were the case, wouldn't you think it would've happened by now? Is US leadership that bad that they failed to address this risk? Or - more likely - is it because solving the issue will take a lot more than some quick investment?
This is a huge issue for the US MIC. Plans (e.g. with regard to Iran) are going back to the drawing board for sure.
> Is US leadership that bad that they failed to address this risk?
I mean, quite obviously? Borne by the simple fact of... here we are discussing it?
It doesn't matter how easy, quick, or hard it is right now. What matters is leadership is so bad it was allowed to reach this point to begin with, and even a decade ago it was immediately obvious that it was a giant vulnerability that has not even started on beyond corrected in any meaningful way.
You’ve seen numbers, so you make uneducated conclusions.
I’m so fucking glad I’m not on social media.
Uneducated conclusions like seeing 70-80% being imported means losing access to the exporters would be devastating? Seeing those numbers shows exactly how far away the US is from being self reliant? See how it means that the US is in a weak negotiating position, and that any bolstering from the orange man is pure bullshit? Please, enlighten me where these uneducated conclusions are wrong.
USA does not have the refining capacity which will take another 8 years to build out.
Wrong. We don’t need to build refining capacity. We just need to remind China that who’s the big dog, which we seem to be doing.
They’ll fall in line quickly enough.
I really cannot tell if this is sarcasm (seems not?) or trolling (sounds like it).
How are we reminding China that the US is a big dog? By imposing tariffs? By demonstrating our ability to do work domestically that they believe us unwilling or incapable of doing?
What does this even mean, to be a big dog in the modern world? It seems more like a large ship listing to one side … if it collapses there will be a lot of small ships damaged in the wake.
> We just need to remind China that who’s the big dog, which we seem to be doing.
Time to short the US dollar and load up on Bitcoin.
Aye yea, the war will be over by Christmas!
I've heard this one before.
Operation Warp Speed 2.0
I always wondered how the large unified world of Roman Empire with running water and sewer fell apart (and backwards) into multitude of small feudal pieces with no technology to speak of for the 1000 years after Roman Empire. I think our modern civilization is probably at the beginning of similar process.
_Washington Post_ just had an article about why (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/10/12/america-r...).
"In 1984, a German historian compiled 210 explanations historians had suggested for Rome’s fall, from lead poisoning and barbarian invasions to Christianity, moral decline and gout.
After studying dynamic civilizations such as Athens, Rome, Abbasid Baghdad, Song China, Renaissance Italy and the Dutch Republic, I can attest that there is no single explanation. Each golden age had its own character and its own downfall."
I always figured it was a combination of the volcanic winter of 536[1] and the Justinianic plague[2] (which happened right as the eastern roman empire was reconquering the western empire to reunify).
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_winter_of_536 and https://www.science.org/content/article/why-536-was-worst-ye...
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plague_of_Justinian
And i have my own ideas why it fell :) My point though ins't about pure why. It is about why it went into such feudal fractal mode.
As I understand it, the Roman Empire was fuelled by expansion (stealing other people stuff), enabled by their exceptional military machine. Once they could not profitably expand any further, they were in trouble.
It lasted for many centuries after they ran out of stuff to conquer, so no.
Aren't you exaggerating it?
I lived in USSR, and know first hand that it means to be separated from common technological space. USSR wasn't that small, especially if one adds Eastern Block, yet it was falling behind the world becoming fully incapable to produce their own comparable computers, cars, etc.. If world get to split into such islands, the speed of technological progress will fall dramatically while social progress may go fully backwards. If you look at some ideologies rising around the world - they are straight medieval, and in many cases only connectedness to outside world has been preventing them from taking over their "islands".
Sorry, I probably should have quoted to which part I was referring. It's:
> with no technology to speak of for the 1000 years after Roman Empire
While it's true that some technology declined in the West, it wasn't as dramatic as you've suggested. Popular media also often exaggerates it.
https://www.britannica.com/technology/history-of-technology/...
Adding USSR into the discussion greatly increases complexity of the discussion. From analysis I've read, central planning is supposedly fine when country doesn't have much industry, because to start things up, it can provide essential investments and starts organizing production. But when country is somewhat developed, efficiency starts to matter and top-down approach to decision making of central planning vs bottom-up decision making mechanisms of markets produce different results. Politics and other things are important factors too, but I think that would be too much for this discussion.
As in -- "no technology to speak of" is a gross misrepresentation of the reality of the middle ages. The fact of the matter is, they were strictly more technologically advanced than the classical Romans, with inventions like the heavy plow and three-field rotation improving agricultural productivity significantly beyond what Romans had achieved.
> The fact of the matter is, they were strictly more technologically advanced than the classical Romans
No, they were more advanced in certain ways, but the original contention is correct that they were less advanced in others. Notably they were unable to build domes. They were also less productive, so less advanced in an overall sense.
What do you mean when you say they were unable to build domes?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_medieval_Arabic_and...
Only the Western Roman Empire fell and even that part was fairly on track to recovery once Charlemagne came into the scene.
The fall of the Roman Empire is a pop history trope at this point.
Charlemagne empire wasn't an interconnected fabric of roads, trade, centralized administration and so forth, ie. it wasn't all that that Roman Empire was, and all that having gone is the fall of Roman Empire. Charlemagne empire was just an aggregation of conquered lands under his personal rule which thus he easily divided between his sons.
I think we are fine in term of infra -- I don't work as a civil engineer, but considering companies in my city repair the roads every year /s they probably retain the knowledge.
How easy is the machinery and tools needed to keep all the infrastructure running? Earth movers are pretty maintainable and barely depreciate. Survey tools though? They have gotten famcy right? Water management has gone quite high tech in some ways. I could see them falling apart kind of like when some hospitals had to revert to paper tape logs. It didn't scale anymore.
> Earth movers are pretty maintainable and barely depreciate
Beware hardware DRM locking up the repairs. That would make everything more fragile.
The infra today is internet and semiconductors which run it, as well as global shipping without each we end up without even necessities.
Exactly. Building roads and aqueducts were empire-level knowledge skills in Ancient Rome, performed by the army legions. Thankfully they're highly localized skills today.
Why stop there why not Indus Valley Civilization
our knowledge (at least my knowledge of it) is much much smaller that that of Roman Empire, and in particular i don't know whether the fall of that civilization demonstrated the effect of splitting into multitude technologically inferior pieces stagnating for such a long time after that.
This is it.
That whole REE thing is more of a scare tactic than anything. REEs are really not all that rare, and the current imports of REEs into the US are worth around $200-250M annually. That is millions, not billions. It's actually a laughably small amount.
The main reason that it's mostly China producing them may simply be due to the fact that the volumes are so small that building your own industry is not really worth it.
Strategic REEs, i.e. heavyREE (Dysprosium, Terbium) are infact exceptionally rare, as in GEOLOGICALLY RARE. They are produced in China, because China (and Myanmar deposits controlled by China) are where ionic clays containing strategic HREEs can be economically extracted at scale. It's not just building altenrate HREE (empahsis on H) is not worth it, the technology simply doesn't exist to do so in other geologic deposits, i.e. all the har rock REE US+co has access to. The fact is PRC controls 90% of deposits and 99% percent of processing for elements that enable high temperature magnets, high power sensors, EW aka all the good shit that enables modern military capabilities... which was designed BECAUSE PRC commericialized process on specific geologic deposits that enabled commoditizing those materials. US built their miltary overmatch on material science and dirt that PRC controls and is nearly exclusively geopgraphically bound to PRC, with no short/medium term alternatives. PRC as monopoly supplier has much more complete ability to enforce export controls. This is just MIC specific, there's also stuff like dysprosium for highend capacitators where PRC has functionally 100% control, i.e. less performant alternative materials would effective regress performance by 10-25%, comparable to losing node size.
I really wonder how much rare earth element deposits are not found for want of looking. Not much reason to source them yourselves if the country (China) uses them for products that you're going to buy.
According to this map, China has vastly more. But is there something special about China/Myanmar geologically? I guess being downstream of the Himalayas is something.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/rare-eart...
The clays are all over the world, the processing to extract the REE's of interest is still intensive regardless.
"According to this map" is essentially meaningless w/out a map specific definition of "reserve".
The terms "reserve", "resource" and their variations are misused outside of technical literature that cites whether they are defined via a JORC or other classification.
The bias toward China in that map likely comes from two notes:
* "proven" reserves - as in tested and estimated to some higher standard, as opposed to "we know there's a lot 'over here' but we haven't spent $X million on a drill assay program yet.
* "controlled or owned" by China - Chinese companies are majority shareholders in joint ventures that source raw materials across the globe (they source concentrates from Australia, from Peru, from elsewhere, in addition to their home soil deposits). This means a number of maps might show all REE deposits owned by Chinese companies as on the books for China (as that is where much of the processing of concentrates occurs).
For interest:
North Stanmore in Western Australia has emerged as one of the world's most extraordinary heavy rare earth element (HREE) deposits, particularly for dysprosium and terbium in North Stanmore. (Sept, 2025)
https://discoveryalert.com.au/news/north-stanmore-heavy-rare...
https://www.australianmining.com.au/victory-unearths-world-c...
Dollar value is not the point. For the US MIC this matters a lot. There are not really any ready replacements for some vital weapons components at a time when US weapons stockpiles have been heavily depleted.
If we really needed them they'd cut through the red tape and mine them here, clean water act, screeching idiots, NIMBYs, everything else be damned.
So, we’ll pay more and still get them. You think China is the only one that can game the system?
Who’s got the money?
The usual solutions - money and violence - are not applicable here. China doesn't need the money and can't be bullied. Sources other than China are not going to cut it in the short and mid term. This is a geopolitical nightmare for the US and deserves more media attention.
There is a new facility coming online from MP Materials (see https://fortworthreport.org/mp-materials-awarded-58-5-millio...) later this year that serves dual purpose customers (GM and the US gov)
> The main reason that it's mostly China producing them may simply be due to the fact that the volumes are so small that building your own industry is not really worth it.
There's also an element of their production generating pollution and us preferring to think of ourselves as cleaner than that. We only use the rare earths.
Compare how desalinization is very cheap, but California prefers constant screaming about drought.
We have a similar law in Italy, but, not having much advanced technology foreigners are willing to buy, the government uses it to prevent foreigners from buying washing machine manufacturers.
So what just happened logistically?
I assume this is an entirely independent Chinese company without some Dutch sponsor or something. That conforms to local regulations. But now The Dutch government says "we have this new power over you" and that is that. With the consequence presumably being export control on dutch tech, banning from their market, etc? Or were there any more hooks planted that make it easier to force compliance? For example -- and I assume this is not the case in the Netherlands -- in China there is a 51% ownership of the foreign company by a local company (which is more or less state controlled).
> I assume this is an entirely independent Chinese company without some Dutch sponsor or something.
It's not, it's a Dutch company, formed according to Dutch law, with headquarters in the Netherlands, that was bought by another Chinese company a few years ago.
Dutch law sets rules on how any company, but especially public companies (so-called naamloze vennootschappen) must be governed. Even if you own all the shares, by law you don't have unlimited and unchecked power in the company, you have to abide by governance rules.
Seemingly simultaneously with the government order, a suit was brought to the court enforcing these laws (the Ondernemingskamer) alledging that the CEO and owner were not abiding by them. The court documents are a bit weird to me as a non-lawyer, with Nexperia named as both plaintiff and defendant, so I'm not sure who brought it, but it might've been the government, who are named as a party.
The court agreed that the suit could have merit, and as an interim measure while the legal proceedings play out, has suspended the CEO and named a temporary director. It also suspended the authority of the owners over their shares (except for one), and assigned a trustee to manage them temporarily. The court did not actually rule on the contents of the suit yet, it only issued interim conservatory measures. We'll likely hear more about how the suit plays out over the next few months.
An interesting matter of contention in the suit is that the CEO/owner want the CLO to be suspended, while the other side asks the court to prohibit firing of the CLO. I presume there has been a conflict in the board, either leading to or caused by the government order.
The court documents are public by the way (in Dutch, obviously): https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/resultaat?zoekterm=nexperi...
Sounds like the OR (ondernemingsraad) apparently wants to get rid of the CEO for incompetence which is very interesting. It is extremely hard to prove (in a court of law) but a valid reason. I assume they were doing all kind of shady things if they go that route. (Havent read the Court Docs, it is a guess)
OR vs CEO also explains the duplicate entries as they are both representatives of the company.
From what I've read it was the company's own board that asked for the ceo (Wing) to be removed.
> I assume this is an entirely independent Chinese company.
It's worth noting that Nexperia is a spin-off of NXP (Dutch company) which itself is a spin-off of Philips' (Dutch company) semiconductor division.
It's also worth noting that Nexperia's Chinese owners (Wingtech) are at least partially state controlled.
Nexperia was also spun off to placate Chinese regulators back when Qualcomm wanted to acquire NXP, and then after the spin off the Chinese regulators still refused to approve the acquisition.
Does that mean teensy mcu are now chinese owned? That was one of the last non chinese mcu available.
Teensy is based on iMXRT which are NXP, not Nexperia.
Perhaps also worth noting that ASML is also a spin-off of Philips.
And that the two collaborate closely on all kinds of projects, and that NXP (the former owner of the business unit that became Nexperia) and Nexperia (the company that is the focus of this action) are both customers of ASML.
Maybe pressure from the US gov? As a negotiatingtactic vs China - remeber the moves against MotorSich in Ukraine some years back , where the deal was win-win for both but Washington put the kibosh on it and ultimately got destroyed by Russian offensive. Since the speed/urgency and unusual application of the law as you mention , mean extraodinary actions must have quite extraordinary causes. In any case still too many unknowns in the story , hopefully clarity ensues soonest.
Believe it or not, but the dutch government has agency. It's not impossible for US pressure to be a factor, but I think it's more likely the management of the company was planning to move production to china or something like that. That'd (rightly!) spook the government into some quick action, especially given the political climate around Russia seemingly not being content with having their war confined to Ukraine.
Unfortunately we seem to be living in interesting times.
The US has immense pressure on the dutch government, given their control over ASML . Its US big tech and semi design studios that determines who will need to buy EUV from ASML. Given ASML is not allowed to do business with China, Russia etc.
You could just add easily argue that the Dutch government has immense leverage over the US, since ASML controls the leading edge fab technology that underpins Nvidia etc. It seems more to me like a highly profitable partnership that neither side can credibly threaten to withdraw from.
Although without any proof, but the Cold War history convinces me that US usually has the better hands when dealing with EU. US has the bigger and better sticks.
Where else will they buy EUV from?
> Unfortunately we seem to be living in interesting times.
China played a remarkably smart game. We let it happen.
People have been telling us for twenty years that this would happen and nobody listened until it was almost too late.
Either way, it cannot be stopped, China will develop independent technology sector because they can and they have no other choice. They don't trust the West and cases like this make such attitude understandable.
As soon as China tries to compete with the rich monopolies, the "free market" goes out of the window and becomes "free to do as we tell you".
> As soon as China tries to compete with the rich monopolies, the "free market" goes out of the window and becomes "free to do as we tell you".
Hence big tech cozying up to this administration, and all the attempts to ban AI regulation.
China won already, US is just trying to stop the bleeding
>As soon as China tries to compete with the rich monopolies, the "free market" goes out of the window and becomes "free to do as we tell you".
When China cannot compete with incumbents those protections also go up and when they can now people like you appeal to free trade (while ignoring existing protections). You are being overly charitable to one side here. Which is it? Free trade or Protectionism?
A big distinction is the Chinese do not meddle with affairs outside their borders.
They do, all the time. Price dumping is one example.
Industrial and scientific espionage is another one.
Hacking companies is one more.
I don’t think those count as meddling with affairs. Those are like, daily business for an average American company.
Can you show me a few examples of American companies hacking Chinese companies?
Of course its protectionism for China, so they can bolster their own economy, but free trade for the US, so they can bleed us dry.
> can now people like you appeal to free trade
You're assuming too much and, along with others here, acting like you've been hurt. "Free trade" is the mantra of Western economists and politicians since the time of Adam Smith, and it's been a ruse since then too. Read him.
> When China cannot compete with incumbents those protections also go up.
They do, but not in the erratic manner, levels or timing we're observing here. China is a party of the WTO and they haven't broken any of its agreements, nor have they used any of its emergency clauses.
> You are being overly charitable to one side here. Which is it? Free trade or Protectionism?
It's not either/or. I can tell you a third option that is worse than both of these - it's jumping from one to the other and back in an erratic manner as we are doing it now.
I could tell you something that's better than all of these too but I won't do it. I've been talking about it for many years, primarily as an alternative to free trade and I'm amazed that at this time, nobody seems to be aware of it. Like, what's the point of pointing out obvious truths over and over again with the same (lack of) result.
Ultimately the Dutch, like for instance the Australians, are a rounding error compared to China and a pawn in a bigger game. At least the Dutch can "hide" behind the EU.
So there will noise but this won't stop China' rise and it won't stop Europe's decline, either.
> "knowledge leak" (w/e that means exactly)
At least in my tongue - this would mean “brain drain”.
The Goods Availability Act invoked in this case, grants power to requisition goods in case of emergency situations, and owners must be compensated.
What I don't see in the official announcement is the nature of the emergency in this case.
Ref: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0002098/2021-07-01/
Could be worse. Could be TikTok and threat to national security.
Germany implemented something similar like this after China took over Kuka (industry leading robotics) and practically build an entire industry of robotics in China after that.
And of course, the jobs disappeared from Germany.
Did they? As far as I know Kuka is still fully controlled by Midea.
The regulation was created after that
the jobs didn't disappear (yet). they grew from 13.000 in 2014 before midea took over to 15.000 in 2024. maybe they could have grown more in germany if midea hadn't taken over. who knows.
There are only about 3200 jobs in Augsburg (Germany), it's HQ?
https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/KUKA-AG-436260/ne...
Note: Looking for more information about the distribution of jobs atm ( countries). But it's hard to find. Any resources?
But you're right. They still have jobs there, I didn't knew that.
Note: This is about the law Germany created afterwards: https://www.akingump.com/en/insights/alerts/germany-tightens...
well, the real question is, are those 15.000 employees in germany? and were they in germany before? i just found the number on wikipedia, but now i looked up the 2024 report that says that 4600 are in germany, and 10600 are outside. in the 2014 report it says 4700 are in germany, 4500 rest of europe, 1700 north america, and 1100 elsewhere. so it doesn't look like any jobs were moved.
thanks for the context.
any idea what we the rationale/reason to pass that law in the first place? any specific endangered war resource at the time?
nincompoops... learned a new word today
It has an interesting etymology: https://nydamprintsblackandwhite.blogspot.com/2014/09/words-...
It's a bit pathetic that European countries do not have the tech capacity to compete equally without having to do stuff like this.
(Not saying China is playing fair btw, just saying there's a vast amount of underused intellectual resources in Europe.)
As long as western companies cannot freely buy companies in China the reverse shouldn't be possible, too.
Business with dictatorships must stop as soon as possible. In fact it should be forbidden. Nothing good comes out of that. I hope we will see more moves like this from democratic governments.
Time to quote one of my favourite lines in the Godfather franchise. Probably totally unrelated.
“We gladly put you at the helm of our little fleet, but our ships must all sail in the same direction. Otherwise, who can say how long your stay with us will last. It's not personal, it's only business. You should know, Godfather”
— The late venerable Don Lucchesi
I couldn’t place this quote, so I googled it and learned it’s from Godfather Part 3. Bold choice to take your favorite quote from that particular movie. :)
Oh lord no. Pacino’s Scream made acting history and is of the finest scenes to come out of the Strasberg acting ecosystem. Critics gonna crit, but there are some remarkably good things about that film.
Godfather 3 is actually my favorite Godfather movie.
It detours from the mafia line of story and instead dives into the darker maelstrom of high politics.
It is from this movie that I learned about Michele Sindona, about Propaganda Due, and in large gained an undying interest in Cold War and geopolitics. Of course I'm just an amateur who only knows English, Mandarin and a bit of French (for Cold War study I'd say all major EU languages are important), and too much source material was buried in history, awaiting for all relevant parties to die so that it has a chance to go into daylight again.
Yeah there are so many memorable quotes.
Europe's projected semiconductor manufacturing equipment expenditure from 2026-2028 is a rounding error.
Global expenditure on 300mm fab equipment from 2026-2028 is predicted to be USD$374bn with regional breakdown as follows (totaling 100%):
China - USD$95bn (25%)
South Korea - USD$86bn (23%)
Taiwan - USD$75bn (20%)
Americas - USD$60bn (16%)
Japan - USD$32bn (9%)
Europe and Middle East - USD$14bn (4%)
Southeast Asia - USD$12bn (3%)
[1] https://www.semi.org/en/semi-press-release/semi-reports-glob...
yeah, but those machines are built in Europe. Most in Netherlands to be exact, but Holand too.
Netherlands AND Holland? Isn't that the same place?
Also: Even while ASML steppers are built in Netherlands, there are a lot of other non-photolithography tools needed to build a fab in addition to the ASML tools.
> Netherlands AND Holland? Isn't that the same place?
Holland is part of the Netherlands. Not unlike how say Texas is part of the United States.
So in that regard the statement was redundant, yes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holland
And ASML is not in Holland, nor is Nexperia or ASMI. I can't think of any semiconductor business in "Holland".
Nor for long. If the Chinese didn't already have incentives to break ASML's monopoly, they do now.
I don't understand why this suddenly happened (except if asked by the USG in response to the recent scare/reality over rare earths).
The 50% ownership by a sanctioned entity was a reality for a while, and was an issue as soon as the purchase. This didn't change recently. So, this action should have been part of the pre-purchase review (CFIUS in the US...I assume there is an equivalent in China). On the face of it, this all could have been avoided by having a non-sanctioned entity (including another random Chinese company) own enough of the company to get sanctioned entity ownership below 50%.
Negotiation leverage. Had they prevent the purchase in the first place, they won’t have anythings to negotiate now.
Probably the case. The Chinese probably knew about this too and willingly came forward.
> I don't understand why this suddenly happened
I could easily see Nexperia chips appearing in Russian munitions in Ukraine setting this off.
It would also match charging the CEO with "incompetence". It would be pretty easy to win that in court if the chips are appearing in Russian weaponry.
Us placed parent company Wingtech on US Entity List before. Then us probably forced Netherlands to do this.
China bans rare earths, us forces eu to be against China.
So I’d expect more escalations from China.
Definitely US pressure. NL is always eager to get on the good side of the US, even if they get nothing in return. For example participation in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan and Gaza today.
I don't know if something similar was feared, but I would like to remind people of what happened in 2020 with China and ARM.
You don't get into the China market without losing control.
Which came from the US sanctioning Huawei because Huawei was making better chips than Qualcomm and Cisco.
US was posturing to ban China access to Arm. Ultimately, it led to a ban on using TSMC for Chinese companies instead. There is no real justification to do a blanket ban on all Chinese companies except a state-sponsored way to to slow China down in AI race.
Can't you say the same for the West though? This news is about a Chinese company's control being taking over by a Western government.
In no way this is comparable, come on.
When you run your business in China, China runs the copy of your business for you ;)
I do understand that we want to try to see "the same" in the stupidity of our politicians that let all of this happen just like that for many years, but we are different.
It must have slipped by me at the time - what happened with China and ARM?
The Arm China CEO went rogue and spun it off as its own company. ARM HQ were unable to fire him, as he had physical possession of the company's seal stamp. Reading between the lines, the Chinese government chose not to intervene for multiple years.
This stuff constantly happens to foreigners in China and just seems to be mostly due to having bad local legal teams. If your CEO can run off with the company stamps and screw you over.. then it just sounds like amateur hour and you have no idea what you're doing.
The legal system there is fundamentally very bureaucratic - there are rules, but they're very different from the West. You need local help - and a lot of it. You see similar bureaucratic insanity in Japan, though I'm guessing there is just a lot more legal infrastructure for guiding foreign companies there.
So you're saying that ARM just went there to open an office without knowing what they're doing?
We're talking about the same ARM...?
I smell a loose loose situation ahead. Nexperia will have problems sourcing there materials in the future and Europe will sit on a husk of the former company. China is not unheard of starving things they do not benefit from
I'm currently blazing through "Chip War" and can't put it down. This news is fascinating in that context. I highly recommend the book to anyone who hasn't read it.
I read it recently. I thought it was going to be a bit dry and heavy going. But it was a really good read.
TIL Shockley, one of the original pioneers of semi-conductors and Nobel prize winner, was a total shit. His staff hated him so much that the key players left and started a new company (Fairchild). He later became a eugenics crank.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Shockley
Related, the announcement of the Dutch government: https://www.government.nl/latest/news/2025/10/12/minister-of...
I'm not seeing any mention of the Entity List ITT, which seems like the real reason. Via SCMP:
>Some analysts said the move by the Dutch ministry resulted from a new rule issued by the US Bureau of Industry and Security, the agency responsible for export control policies. The rule, effective September 29, imposed new restrictions on entities which are at least 50 per cent owned by enterprises on the Entity List or the Military End-User List – two blacklists issued by the US government.
A bit of history:
Nexperia was formed because back in 2017 (if I remember correctly) Qualcomm wanted to buy NXP. So NXP wanted to look more attractive to Qualcomm shareholders and sold its more low-tech business unit to Chinese investors. That acquisition didn't go through because of the tensions between US and China during the first Trump admin.
NXP has been trimming fat since its formation from Philips Semiconductors and American or Chinese companies are buying whatever business unit they can grab. They pretty much buy it for the IP and the customers. Once they get the IP they usually fore the whole team and shut dient operations in NL.
Nexperia wasn't doing this though. They had no interesting technology to steal oe transfer to China to begin with.
> NXP has been trimming fat since its formation from Philips Semiconductors
Honestly it appears to me that Philips themselves have just been losing talent/marketshare/I'm not even sure what, causing their gradual decline. The Philips I grew up with was an electronics powerhouse. Today apart, from their healthcare department (and maybe their slightly overpriced lighting department via Signifify), they don't seem to be very "active", and that makes me sad.
Would be interested to hear some details on this from someone within Nexperia (or the automotive customers it supplied), if anyone is here on HN
That governmental decision was surely not taken lightly, it's a significant move with high risk of increasing geopolitical tension...
That will not happen. But yes, you are right that this decision was not taken lightly, I've only heard of one other such move in the last 50 years or so.
The Chinese propaganda machine is already making lots of waves about how NL is no longer a democracy and how this dings NL reputation abroad.
The Dutch have put restrictions on Wingtech to not make certain changes (sale or move of assets, intellectual property, company activities, employees) for a year. That should give you enough to chew on I think (and it is public knowledge). Specifically the IP and assets bits are in focus here, more so because the parent company is on a watchlist. Note that they not only kicked out the CEO - which in itself is an earth shaking move for a company this big - they also took control over the shares.
50 years of sending all the knowledge to China and now sudden realization that „data is the value”. Work was cheap, but we paid in IP and tech as a whole. It’s great to see how long term is China strategy and how well they execute it.
Good luck for us all being „independent”. We can make processors out of attached plastic bottle caps…
It is funny that there are more people blaming China than the shareholders that made trillions of dollars.
Also real kicker from 2022:
The UK used its National Security & Investment Act (2021) to order divestment of Nexperia’s Newport Wafer Fab in Nov 2022. The UK ordered them to sell 86% of the stake due to National Security concerns
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/acquisition-of-ne...
There was also some drama around British Steel back in April with the government seizing control from China:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckg17g39x41o
afaik there was the added danger there that if the blast furnaces are turned off its very difficult /impossible to start them again.
alt link https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3328726/ch...
Thanks, we'll add that to the toptext as well.
Nexperia makes quite a line-up of parts. Huge range of pretty low level things, various logic and bus small devices, mountains of transistors. https://www.mouser.com/manufacturer/nexperia/featured-produc...
They have a not huge but very nice line-up of GaN fet devices too. I'd been looking through their line-up here just lack week!
Just fun to see what's on offer here. I couldn't find a latest listings by manufacturer for Nexperia, which is one of my favorite Mouser views.
so is the company that taken over gonna get compensated or its just nation takeover for free????
They are not being taken over. The Dutch government says it can now reverse or hold back decisions made within the company if they are deemed damaging to the Dutch or European production. I assume the law is written in a way that allows the government to only intervene if it is for such things. A judge would ultimately decide whether it is, if it gets to that point.
Even if they get compensated when the .gov buys your stuff it's never a fair price.
Expect more of this to come, it's an unstated goal of the Chinese Communist Party to deindustrialize the West, the UK had to intervene too a few months ago to stop them from destroying their steel producing capacity.
Well, when you read things like this [0] you wonder if they have not reached it yet? I mean, they are producers and sellers now.
[0]: https://www.bundeskartellamt.de/SharedDocs/Meldung/EN/Presse...
The west is doing a fine job at deindustrializing all by itself.
The timing is weird, just after Trump's latest escalation with China. Using The Netherlands to fall into the sword would fit with the general tactics of dumping the Ukraine war on the EU and trying to sour their relations with China.
That way, the U.S. is free to control all oil resources in the Middle East and conquer new ones in Venezuela. The EU gets nothing but enemies and higher oil and gas prices.
In principle I'm against outsourcing or technology transfers to China, but please do it on you own schedule.
> In principle I'm against outsourcing or technology transfers to China, but please do it on you own schedule.
In principle, the tit for tat policy with China should have been initiated 15 years ago. China has restricted its own markets in similar ways since at least that far back, and it was clear then, when they banned Google in 2010, that they were not playing by the same playbook as we were.
The U.S. doesn't control oil in the Middle East, that would be Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Iran, etc, all sovereign nations with their own governments. It also produces more domestically than its own demand and is a net exporter of oil.
Also, not sure why the Ukraine war is the United States responsibility over the EU's responsibility given that its your next-door neighbor and its your eastern flank that would suffer if Ukraine were to fall to Russian control. EU, of course, partly responsible for enriching Russia to the point where it can afford such a war with its own purchases of gas while shuttering nuclear power plants for indescribable reasons.
One point to clear up, China did not ban Google. Google left China because they refused to comply with Chinese data sovereignty laws.
Google even tried to crawl back with a search engine that did comply with Chinese laws put activist employees forced them to stop.
Both Microsoft and Apple fully comply with Chinese laws and are doing really well there.
When I hear "data sovereignty" I usually think of things like transfers to another country, etc. Are you using it to refer to censorship here?
If memory serves, China wanted to censor Google, Google declined (had a redirect to the Hong Kong site for a while), China blocked accessing foreign Google sites. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_China has more.
People like to play the victims, nobody else wanted to buy these unattractive companies back then, but once these companies are turned around or eventually fail, suddenly they are of national importance, we were ripped off.
The Google Facebook examples probably would hold better if the US hadn't axed TikTok, also, Google isn't banned in China, they refused to comply with censorship regulations and left themselves.
Rules only apply when the people that set the rules win, maybe China is to be blamed for seeing through this cruel world earlier.
Google did not even leave, they have a huge office tower in Beijing, Zhongguancun.
Ukraine-Russian conflict is a result of US instigation. Totally their responsibility.
The invasion of Ukraine by Russia is the result of Russian instigation.
> The timing is weird, just after Trump's latest escalation with China.
The news is coming out now, but it actually happened September 30th.
Correlation != causation.
Great. Absolutely outstanding from the Dutch government, to not let China dominate Europe however it wants.
Securing a Chip industry independent from China, Taiwan and the US has to be the top long term security interest. I only hope that the EU can use it's power to make things like this more feasible and to keep Europe independent from US/Chinese interests.
> Great. Absolutely outstanding from the Dutch government, to not let China dominate Europe however it wants.
Arguably the time to do that was in 2018, they could have blocked Nexperia from being aquired by Wingtech in the first place. But I supposed the second best time is now.
The same government forced NXP to sell its RF power division to Chinese JAC in 2015 due to NXP and Freescale merger. Isn't that great?
Firstly, that wasn't "the same government". Secondly, better course correct now than never.
Hope you would be as excited when other countries start to follow the lead.
Of course. Securing Europes independence is extremely important, other countries should follow and seize more Chinese assets.
This excuse could be used by many countries to seize European companies controlling strategic national resources
Let's be real here, a European company wouldn't even have been allowed to buy a Chinese company in China and have the level of control as in this case in the first place.
This is it pretty much, not sure why it took so long to come to this realization. Was it greed that caused a warp in rational and common sense?
Greed. When China was becoming manufacturing powerhouse, it was incredibly cheap, and Chinese government seemed extremely willing to play ball by making sure there was no government caused slowdowns. This obviously worked until it didn't but even now, it's so expensive to change, corporations are screaming about their quarterly stock price and US being so financialized, US in a real gordian knot.
Just the religious belief that The Free Market will solve everything on its own and there should be no attempt to interfere with it.
I never understood this, I believe very strongly in the free market, but only where there is a free market. Of course you can let the free market run free up to the border of e.g. the US but surely it won't solve international trade since many countries do not have a free market. Unless we agree some international rules such that the boundary of the free market "sandbox" becomes the earths borders.
It's why I also think it is possible to hold a pro-free-market pro-tariff position simultaneously without contradiction. Tariffs could be used to "level set" manipulation from foreign governments and make the incoming goods behave as if they were not manipulated (thus also reducing the incentive to manipulate in the first place).
Not sure this is how tariffs are being used in reality.
You are 100% correct. Free Trade hasn't been disproven, only the inane notion that one should pursue unreciproval free trade with a countries that perform mercantalism against them.
The consumer isn't everything, the worker does matter just as much.
>You are 100% correct. Free Trade hasn't been disproven
"nono, that's not REAL communism, that's just dictatorship!"
"nono that's not REAL free trade, it's government intervention!"
"And I Would Have Gotten Away With It Too, If It Weren't For You Meddling Kids!"
Funny how when you get to the two end of the spectrum of economic theories you suddenly get to horseshoe theory of politics.
Maybe in a century or two we will finally see that armchair theories that disregard human nature and builds on simplified models of the world, have its limitations, rather than insisting that unless it haven't been 100% practiced to its Puritan image, it can't be disproven.
Greed sure, but also optics. In the US at least, we love to condemn China for being "communist" and not a real democracy. Remember, for the US, communist has been the number one enemy for a long time. Obviously, we can't do what they do.
But we do what they do, and China isn't even communist.
China is communist. Interesting how often outsiders are so sure a country led by the CPC isn’t Marxist.
And it might even be valid too.
And which firms in China are controlled by European entities?
I don't know what you are talking about
In China, most locally manufactured brands seem to vanish after roughly two decades — whether in clothing, food, daily necessities, automobiles, or electronics. Yet, global brands such as Coca-Cola, Nike, Adidas, P&G, Unilever, Colgate, Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Audi (collectively known as “BBA” in China), and even Nokia, dominate the market;
Interestingly, many European companies were eventually overtaken by their American counterparts — Nokia for example.
We’re not even talking about computers and smartphones—when it comes to these sectors, the U.S. simply won’t allow anyone else to take the lead. The market is dominated almost entirely by just a few platforms: Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android.
European companies have had massive investments in China for decades now.
Many people in the West have no idea what's going on in China. Western brands and investments are all over the place. Half the cars on the streets used to be European or American (and that has only recently changed, due to the rise of EVs).
Yet Europeans and Americans often complain, "Why can't Western companies operate in China?" Excuse me?
China's rules, present and historical, on joint ventures and banned investment sectors seem like a conspicuous omission in your comment.
The question was, emphasis mine: "which firms in China are controlled by European entities?"
Western brands have investments, but are required by law to have a local partner, that learns the trade and eventually copies the product:
China bars foreign companies from participating on their own in many industries, but in some of those industries foreign companies can participate only by forming a joint venture with a Chinese partner. [..] Partnering with a Chinese business can be tricky for various reasons, so understanding to what you are agreeing is absolutely critical. This is especially true because the Chinese law, the Chinese government, and the Chinese courts will be heavily biased in favor of your joint venture partner in any dispute between your company and your China joint venture partner’s company. - https://harris-sliwoski.com/chinalawblog/china-joint-venture...
> Half the cars on the streets used to be European or American
And more than half the phones in Europe or America are Asian - what's your point?
That’s a common misconception, but it's factually incorrect. European companies can, and do, acquire and control companies in China.
The legal framework and the reality on the ground show a very different picture.
1. The Law Explicitly Allows It: China's Foreign Investment Law (effective since Jan 1, 2020) clearly states that foreign investors are permitted to acquire the shares, equity, or other similar interests of domestic Chinese enterprises.
2. The "Negative List" System: China uses a "Negative List" model. This means any industry not on the list is fully open to foreign investment, often up to 100% ownership. This list has been shrinking every year, opening up more sectors. For instance, all restrictions in the manufacturing sector were removed. While there are still restrictions in very specific strategic areas (like news media or rare earth mining), this is not a blanket ban by any means.
3. Real-World Examples of European-Controlled Companies in China:
You don't have to search hard to find major Chinese operations controlled by European firms. Here are just a few high-profile examples:
Automotive: German automaker BMW raised its stake in its Chinese joint venture, BMW Brilliance Automotive, to 75%. This is a landmark case of a European company taking majority control of a major automotive manufacturer in China. Similarly, Volkswagen owns a 75% stake in its EV-focused Volkswagen Anhui venture.
Chemicals: Germany’s BASF is building a massive new Verbund site in Guangdong. It's a €10 billion project that is 100% owned and operated by BASF.
Retail & Consumer Goods: All IKEA (Sweden) stores in China are operated by its wholly-owned subsidiary. French beauty giant L'Oréal and luxury groups like LVMH and Kering all operate through wholly foreign-owned enterprises in China.
Finance: German insurer Allianz established Allianz (China) Insurance Holding, the very first 100% foreign-owned insurance holding company in the country.
So, the idea that a European company "wouldn't be allowed" to buy a Chinese company is a myth. While the process involves regulations (just like any country), it is legally possible and happens frequently across many industries.
There are many companies which the Chinese government could target in retaliation. In China foreign companies are usually minority partners in some ventures with some Chinese company.
> foreign companies are usually minority partners
So, uh, none?
Let's hope so
It's ok. It's fine when the EU does it. It's only wrong and against capitalism when others do it. Like protectionism.
I think its fine to have national and strategic interests. China isn't someone that you can just trust, they are exporting to Russia on the sly and therefore supporting war in Europe because it suits them.
> and therefore supporting war in Europe because it suits them.
FWIW, EU countries are still sending more money to Russia for oil than they send Ukraine in aid. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/24/eu-spends-more...
Modern global economies are complicated.
This is a tired talking point. If the EU stopped those imports abruptly they'd blow up their own economies and there would be chaos on the streets.
It is stupid that they put themselves in that position, but they've also greatly reduced their dependency as the war progressed.
With the current trade war and their own domestic troubles, China cannot afford to alienate other foreign markets, hence why this is the prime time to drive concessions against them.
> they are exporting to Russia on the sly
is it really on the sly though?
The Euro stance on buying US weapons for Ukraine is probably the most dumbest strategic move or the century. Europe is losing at an alarming rate in many ways. I would be more concerned about the US if I were Europe.
Well clearly clinging free trade while others pursue protectionism/industrial strategy at massive scales against you isn't sustainable.
Is it hypocrisy of you decide to punch back after getting punched? Not really. And China certainly was the much more protectionist than the EU for the three decades.
Why is "against capitalism" == wrong? Maybe it's right because it's against capitalism.
Okay. Now do that for most major Dutch companies please.
Sell your industry to private equity, this is what happens. Someone who values it will take it up. Many such cases.
> extraordinary move to ensure a sufficient supply of its chips remains available in Europe amid rising global trade tensions.
It’s like they beg China to do something with Taiwan.
The title is misleading. The Dutch government says it can now reverse or hold back decisions made within the company if they are deemed damaging to the Dutch or European production. I assume the law is written in a way that allows the government to only intervene if it is for such things. A judge would ultimately decide whether it is, if it gets to that point.
I wouldn't call that "taking control" necessarily. Taking "some" control maybe. But in a reasonable way.
> Wingtech Chairman Zhang Xuezheng had been immediately suspended from his roles as executive director of Nexperia Holdings and nonexecutive director of Nexperia after the ministerial order, according to the filing.
Not sure what firing the boss is, if not taking control...