Taiwan jails ex‑TSMC engineer
- Taiwan’s Intellectual Property and Commercial Court sentenced former TSMC engineer Chen Li-ming to 10 years for leaking 2-nanometer trade secrets to Tokyo Electron Taiwan. - The court also fined Tokyo Electron Taiwan NT$150 million, with four other defendants jailed up to six years and one manager given probation. - The ruling is Taiwan’s first National Security Act conviction involving chip “national core key technologies.” (focustaiwan.tw)
A Taiwan court sentenced former TSMC engineer Chen Li-ming to 10 years in prison on April 27 for leaking chipmaking trade secrets to Tokyo Electron Taiwan. (focustaiwan.tw) The Intellectual Property and Commercial Court said the stolen material involved TSMC’s 2-nanometer process, a leading-edge manufacturing technology Taiwan classifies as a “national core key technology.” (focustaiwan.tw) (english.cw.com.tw) Tokyo Electron Taiwan was fined NT$150 million, with the court saying the penalty could be suspended if the company pays NT$100 million to TSMC and NT$50 million to the treasury. (focustaiwan.tw) (taipeitimes.com) Four other defendants were also convicted. Former TSMC engineers Wu Ping-chun and Ko Yi-ping got three years and two years, Chen Wei-chieh got six years, and Tokyo Electron Taiwan manager Lu Yi-yin received a 10-month suspended sentence and a NT$1 million fine. (focustaiwan.tw) Prosecutors said Chen Li-ming had worked in TSMC’s Fab 12 yield engineering unit before moving to Tokyo Electron Taiwan’s marketing division. They said he used former colleagues to obtain confidential data between the second half of 2023 and the first half of 2025. (focustaiwan.tw) The information included secrets tied to etching equipment for 2-nanometer production. Prosecutors said Tokyo Electron used the material to evaluate and improve equipment performance as it sought more supply positions at TSMC. (focustaiwan.tw) (taipeitimes.com) Taiwan treated the case as more than a private corporate dispute. Focus Taiwan said it was the first case involving a corporate entity under the National Security Act tied to national core key technologies. (focustaiwan.tw) CommonWealth Magazine’s English edition said the verdict was the first conviction under the amended National Security Act in a case involving semiconductor trade secrets. That law was tightened as Taiwan tried to protect advanced chip know-how from industrial espionage. (english.cw.com.tw) TSMC uncovered the case through an internal investigation and filed a complaint on July 8, 2025. Investigators searched and questioned suspects from July 25 to July 28, and prosecutors later indicted the main defendants in August 2025. (focustaiwan.tw) (taipeitimes.com) The ruling is a first-instance judgment and can still be appealed. For now, Taiwan’s courts have put prison time and corporate liability behind the theft of TSMC’s 2-nanometer process data. (focustaiwan.tw)
