The government will cooperate with the High Prosecutors’ Office investigation into alleged intellectual property theft from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), Minister of Economic Affairs Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) said yesterday.
The alleged theft raises national security concerns, and could affect the industry as a whole, leading to losses for local companies, Kung said on the sidelines of a legislative meeting in Taipei.
The ministry would cooperate with prosecutors and explain its control mechanisms for core key technologies to determine whether the incident contravenes the National Security Act (國家安全法), he said.
Photo: CNA
The minister’s remarks followed a report by the Chinese-language Liberty Times (the sister paper of the Taipei Times) that prosecutors were investigating former TSMC senior vice president Lo Wei-jen (羅唯仁), who retired in July after 21 years at the company, for allegedly stealing the foundry’s most advanced process technologies, including 2-nanometer, 16A and 14A technologies, before reportedly joining Intel Corp last month.
Lo allegedly asked his subordinates before retiring to brief him about the advanced technologies and took the confidential documents with him, the Liberty Times reported.
He took more than 80 boxes of data and books when he departed, raising suspicions at TSMC, the daily said.
Before joining TSMC in 2004, Lo worked at Intel in technology development and management.
TSMC is reportedly collecting evidence in preparation for legal action against Lo.
Prosecutors on Tuesday opened an intellectual property theft investigation into whether Lo contravened the National Security Act and the Trade Secrets Act (營業秘密法), the report said.
Kung said the ministry would provide TSMC assistance should the company file a trade secret lawsuit against Lo, and would monitor the situation closely to determine whether the incident would harm the nation’s semiconductor ecosystem or affect relations with customers.
Asked about government safeguards to prevent leaks of core technologies, Kung said the ministry has established protection mechanisms and would continue to update the scope of core technologies covered.
The ministry is still investigating whether Lo signed a noncompetition agreement with TSMC, which could prevent him from joining a competing company, Kung said.
Once the situation becomes clear, the ministry would discuss with the Industrial Technology Research Institute about whether to suspend or revoke Lo’s laureate title, which was granted to him in September, he said.
The legislature amended the National Security Act in 2022, tightening regulations on industrial espionage and the leaking of operational secrets, while establishing a list of 32 items classified as national core key technologies.
It is up to TSMC to identify which technologies might have been taken, and the ministry would work with prosecutors to explain whether those technologies correspond to any items on the list, Kung said.
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