Seoul Accuses Ex-Samsung Staff of Leaking DRAM Tech to China

A group of former Samsung bosses and employees have been indicted in South Korea for leaking 10nm DRAM technology to China, technology news site Neowin reported. Korean news media It’s called “electricity”.

The Information Technology Crime Investigation Department of the Seoul Central Prosecutor’s Office arrested a former Samsung Electronics employee executive at China Changxin Memory Technology Company (CXMT).

According to the report, this person “is accused of overseeing the development of Changxin Memory’s 10nm DRAM technology. In addition, four other Changxin Memory employees have also been arrested as part of the investigation.”

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DRAM stands for Dynamic Random Access Memory and is a computer chip storage format that stores bits of data in memory cells.

Neowin says CXMT was accused of recruiting key executives and engineers from SamsungHe allegedly transferred proprietary DRAM technology to his new employer.

“These actions are said to have contributed to the mass production of China’s first domestic DRAM in 2023, which is said to be based on stolen technology from Samsung.”

A former Samsung Electronics researcher has been accused of transferring hundreds of handwritten documents detailing Samsung’s 10-nanometer DRAM technology to Changxin Memory after joining the company in 2016.

“Prosecutors say the economic damage to the country’s semiconductor industry could be in the billions of dollars.”

Prosecutors said the Chinese government invested more than $1.7 billion in Changxin Memory, making it China’s “first and only domestic DRAM manufacturer.”

As the news of the leak comes The memory chip market is experiencing a severe shortage Booming demand from the artificial intelligence boom has pushed prices soaring, with companies signing long-term supply contracts.

And this is not the first time the Korean chip giant has encountered this problem. Prosecutors filed a similar case in September last year Engineers accused of using Samsung chip technology to produce 20nm memory chips at a factory in southern China.

See also:

Samsung to make record investment domestically amid U.S. deal concerns

Samsung and Nvidia discuss next-generation memory chip HBM4

AI data centers raise concerns about memory storage devices – TH

Samsung, SK Hynix use open artificial intelligence to create “Korean Stargate”

South Korea arrests former Samsung executive in $3.2 billion Chinese chip tech scandal

Jim Pollard

Jim Pollard is an Australian journalist based in Thailand since 1999. He worked for News Ltd newspapers in Sydney, Perth, London and Melbourne before traveling to South East Asia in the late 1990s. He served as a senior editor at The Nation for more than 17 years.