Dutch government takes control of Chinese-owned chipmaker Nexperia
96 comments
·October 13, 2025markus_zhang
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
dcrazy
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. :)
mmaunder
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.
Doxin
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...
HSO
After what I learned in the last five years, first the pandemic, then Gaza, I dont believe anything, absolutely nothing, from "western" explanations, "news channels", "newspapers", certainly no politicians but also no bureaucrats or officials, nothing.
I only look at actual actions and data and private citizens and actual scholars who wrote enough to gauge if they are knowledgeable and trustworthy from examining their past writings. Anything official or even with a whiff of "officiality" is at best unbelievable, if not countersignaling.
PS. Exception maybe FT, some macro research services like Gavekal, and science focused media. Even technology focused stuff is polluted now with the demented western anxiety and inferiority complex about China.
yoavm
So what exactly are you learning in this case from the actions, the data, the private citizens or the scholars, that is so different from "Western" explanations?
maxdo
EU and west finally TRYING to protect their market the way China is doing it all the time. They tax, ban, espionage everything beneficial to their society.
China would do it without a blink.
mk89
They would, they do and they did it. But we called them communists for doing so. ;)
mk89
> inferiority complex about China.
That's not some s** that someone made up. They/We created an unstoppable beast. They thought that China would be like India or Vietnam or so. Nope.
You name it, they build it.
We can only "regulate" it - see what Europe has come up with to justify it - with the CO2 nonsense, "human rights" and all that. More regulations are the only way to prevent to get your market over flooded by products that you can't possibly build at that speed and cost (and not necessarily quality, but finally, most of what we use come from there and aren't MacBooks good? or fridges/TVs/phones, etc).
maxdo
That’s a myth. Yes, we allow them to move faster—much faster—but it’s simply because their government is more efficient.
Western society, in contrast, runs on a kind of religion. People follow a few belief systems: socialism, right-wing conservatism, and perhaps liberalism as a softer sub-flavor.
Here’s the fun part: China learned the hard way that no single dogma—whether communism or anything else—is worth worshiping if it leaves people hungry. They’ve mixed communism, socialism, and raw capitalism, using whatever tools best serve their progress. Ruthless goal achievement.
Meanwhile, Western society has turned the left-versus-right divide into something resembling the conflict between major branches of Islam—where factions despise and fight each other. It’s extremely foolish.
It's soolish, like any blind reglion following. And yeah, with this divide we have, we all become religios == stupid.
lstodd
Yes, Fourier Transform never lies when you get it right. :-/s
tmnvix
> 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.
walkabout
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.
markus_zhang
Let’s hope this one is still cold.
trhway
I always wondered how the large unified world of Roman Empire with running water and sewer fell apart into multitude of small feudal pieces with no technology to speak of for a 1000 years after Roman Empire. I think our modern civilization is probably at the beginning of similar process.
dylan604
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
dgfitz
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.
nonethewiser
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).
Denvercoder9
> 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...
niels8472
From what I've read it was the company's own board that asked for the ceo (Wing) to be removed.
q3k
> 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.
khuey
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.
teekert
Perhaps also worth noting that ASML is also a spin-off of Philips.
rzerowan
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.
Doxin
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.
dragonelite
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.
mytailorisrich
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.
echelon
> 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.
miohtama
Could be worse. Could be TikTok and threat to national security.
javiramos
nincompoops... learned a new word today
ChrisMarshallNY
It has an interesting etymology: https://nydamprintsblackandwhite.blogspot.com/2014/09/words-...
NicoJuicy
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.
q3k
Did they? As far as I know Kuka is still fully controlled by Midea.
NicoJuicy
The regulation was created after that
em-bee
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.
binarymax
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.
rdl
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%.
tnt128
Negotiation leverage. Had they prevent the purchase in the first place, they won’t have anythings to negotiate now.
bgnn
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.
Luker88
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.
piskov
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...
masfuerte
There was also some drama around British Steel back in April with the government seizing control from China:
rickdeckard
Related, the announcement of the Dutch government: https://www.government.nl/latest/news/2025/10/12/minister-of...
misiek08
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…
rickdeckard
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...
jacquesm
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.
null
h45gJaqk
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.
Denvercoder9
> The timing is weird, just after Trump's latest escalation with China.
The news is coming out now, but it actually happened September 30th.
jacquesm
Correlation != causation.
jauntywundrkind
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.
Related: https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3328726/chinas-wingtech-says-dutch-court-freezes-control-nexperia-amid-national-security-dispute