South Korean chip manufacturing industry experts and analysts called on the government to oppose the “improper request” of the US to require Samsung and other companies to disclose key business information in order to protect local companies related to the industry.
According to the latest report, the US govt’s information requirements include semiconductor products currently being sold, products with the largest backlog, attributes of each product, sales in the past month, manufacturing and packaging locations.
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Apart from this, the current top three customers for each product and the approximate proportion of each customer’s sales of the product should be listed. Several industry sources claim that handing over these data may weaken the bargaining power of local companies and ultimately damage their competitiveness in the global market.
Initially, the US Department of Commerce announced that it might use the Defense Production Act (DPA) to solve the problem of a shortage of American automotive chips. If it takes such actions, all semiconductor companies doing business in the US must submit specific information about their supply chain.
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Generally, the Korean chip industry believes that the US government’s request is an excessive intervention in the market, which is contrary to the principles advocated by the US so far, and the market should be allowed to respond to supply shortages in accordance with its principles.
For large semiconductor companies such as Samsung, disclosing confidential information will expose more weaknesses. No doubt, Samsung is the world’s largest manufacturer of memory chips, second only to TSMC in the booming foundry market.
The US Department of Commerce is not only seeking to obtain information from chip manufacturers that have participated in the recent White House summits, but also from all participants in the industry. This will also force South Korea’s SK Hynix to share confidential data.
