August 15, 2025, 4:10 AM, China Times News Network
【Lan Siao-wei】
Competition between China and the US in the semiconductor field is heating up. According to Guancha’s reporting, Beijing E-Town Semiconductor Technology Co., Ltd. announced on the 13th that it had recently filed a lawsuit with the Beijing Intellectual Property Court, accusing Applied Materials of illegally stealing core technology secrets related to wafer surface treatment and other technologies, and even disclosing them through patent applications in China. The company is seeking 99.99 million RMB (approximately 10 million NTD) in damages.
E-Town stated that using high-concentration, stable, and uniform plasma for wafer surface treatment is a key technology for the company. This technology is widely used in its semiconductor processing equipment, including dry stripping, dry etching, surface treatment, and modification. The company possesses leading, original technical capabilities in this field and holds relevant technical secrets.
Applied Materials hired two employees involved in the case who previously worked at Mattson Technology, Inc. (MTI), a wholly-owned subsidiary of E-Town. These two employees were familiar with the company’s core technologies for plasma generation and processing, and were familiar with and mastered the relevant equipment structures and processes. During their tenure at MTI, both employees signed confidentiality agreements, assuming strict confidentiality obligations regarding technical information, including the technical secrets involved in the case.
By evidence, it disclosed that after Applied Materials hired the two employees, it submitted an invention patent application to CNIPA (China National Intellectual Property Administration), in which the main inventors were the two employees mentioned above. The patent application disclosed the technical secrets involved in the case that were jointly owned by the plaintiff and MTI.
Applied Materials is a world-leading American supplier of semiconductors and display equipment, with more than 22,000 patents. It is the first international semiconductor equipment company to enter China and has a market capitalization of approximately 151.23 billion USD.
It is worth noting that Cailian News reported on the 7th that Applied Materials announced that it would join Apple and Texas Instruments to jointly strengthen the US chip manufacturing industry, and through its factory in Austin, it would provide US-made equipment to Texas Instruments’ production base in the US for the manufacture of basic semiconductors serving Apple products.
E-Town’s main business is the research and development, production and sales of wafer processing equipment required in the integrated circuit manufacturing process. It is one of the few platform-type integrated circuit equipment companies in mainland China with the ability to develop and produce a variety of integrated circuit equipment. It is also the only integrated circuit special equipment company in mainland China that currently has internationally leading technologies in plasma and wafer heat treatment.
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