刚通完电话就翻脸？美对华半导体公司刑事民事双起诉

刚通完电话就翻脸？

美对华半导体公司刑事民事双起诉

美东时间11月1日上午特朗普兴奋地发推说中美两国元首进行了良好的电话沟通；

华尔街为此欢呼无比，普遍认为贸易战将出现缓和气氛；毕竟特朗普扛了半天的贸易战大旗，美国自己并未得到什么实质性的好处，搞不好会影响共和党的中期选情；所以特朗普不论是否出于政治需要，缓和贸易战是双赢的举措。

然而，正当市场一片叫好之际，两国元首上午刚通完电话，美国联邦司法部下午就发布公告：对中国半导体公司晋华发起刑事和民事双诉讼。

据美司法部网站信息显示，美国一个联邦大陪审团对一家中国国有企业、一家中国台湾公司和三名中国台湾人提出起诉，指控他们共谋盗窃、输送和拥有从一家美国半导体公司盗窃来的商业秘密，以便为一家国有企业谋取利益。美司法部说，所有被告均被指控共谋从事经济间谍活动等罪名。

被起诉的企业是中国福建晋华集成电路有限公司和中国台湾联华电子股份有限公司(UMC)，他们被控从全球半导体业领军企业、总部在美国的美光公司(Micron)盗取商业秘密。

美国还提起民事诉讼，要求下令禁止继续转让被盗窃的商业秘密，并禁止某些被告向美国出口任何由联华或晋华利用相关商业秘密所制造的产品。起诉书在2018年9月27日提交，11月1日公布。民事诉讼于11月1日提交

此前，美国商务部发布禁令，禁止对晋华公司相关技术出口。

依照美国法律，被起诉并不等于有罪。如果被判罪名成立，个人被告因经济间谍罪名面临最长15年的监禁及5百万美元罚款，因窃取商业秘密罪名面临10年监禁。如果公司被判有罪，每家公司面临被没收非法所得的处罚以及最高逾数百亿美元美元的罚款。

去年12月，美国最大存储芯片生产商美光科技公司(Micron Technology Inc., MU)在加州起诉福建晋华和其台湾合作方联华电子(United Microelectronics Co., 2303.TW)盗取其商业机密。福建晋华否认了相关指控。此案目前仍在加州法院审理中。

今年1月，福建晋华和联华电子在中国控告美光科技的产品侵犯他们各自的专利，7月出台的裁决导致美光部分产品在中国暂时禁售。

晋华会成为下一个中兴通讯吗？值得关注。

以下是11月1日美司法部关于本诉讼的最新通告（免翻译）

Department of Justice

Office of Public Affairs

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PRC State-Owned Company, Taiwan Company, and Three Individuals Charged With Economic Espionage

A federal grand jury indicted a state-owned enterprise of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), a Taiwan company, and three individuals, charging them with crimes related to a conspiracy to steal, convey, and possess stolen trade secrets of an American semiconductor company for the benefit of a company controlled by the PRC government. All of the defendants are charged with a conspiracy to commit economic espionage, among other crimes.  Attorney General Jeff Sessions, FBI Director Christopher Wray, Assistant Attorney General for National Security John Demers, Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division Brian A. Benczkowski, United States Attorney Alex G. Tse of the Northern District of California, and FBI Special Agent in Charge for the San Francisco Field Office John F. Bennett made the announcement.

In addition, the United States filed a civil lawsuit seeking to enjoin the further transfer of the stolen trade secrets and to enjoin certain defendants from exporting to the United States any products manufactured by UMC or Jinhua that were created using the trade secrets at issue.  The indictment was filed on September 27, 2018, and unsealed today. The civil lawsuit was filed today.

“I am announcing that a grand jury in San Francisco has returned a multi-defendant indictment alleging economic espionage on the part of a state-owned Chinese company, a Taiwanese company, and three Taiwan individuals for an alleged scheme to steal trade secrets from Micron, an Idaho-based semi-conductor company,” said Attorney General Sessions.  “Micron is worth an estimated $100 billion and has a 20 to 25 percent share of the dynamic random access memory industry—a technology not possessed by the Chinese until very recently.  As this and other recent cases have shown, Chinese economic espionage against the United States has been increasing—and it has been increasing rapidly.  I am here to say that enough is enough. With integrity and professionalism, the Department of Justice will aggressively prosecute such illegal activity.”

“The theft of intellectual property is not only unfair, but stifles technological innovation by disincentivizing investment in long-term research and development,” said U.S. Attorney Alex Tse.  “The theft of intellectual property on a continuing basis by nation-state actors is an even more damaging affront to the rule of law. We in the Northern District of California, one of the world’s great centers of intellectual property development, will continue to lead the fight to protect U.S. innovation from criminal misappropriation, whether motivated by personal greed or national economic ambition.”

"No country presents a broader, more severe threat to our ideas, our innovation, and our economic security than China," said FBI Director Christopher Wray. "The Chinese government is determined to acquire American technology, and they’re willing use a variety of means to do that – from foreign investments, corporate acquisitions, and cyber intrusions to obtaining the services of current or former company employees to get inside information.  If China acquires an American company's most important technology – the very technology that makes it the leader in a field – that company will suffer severe losses, and our national security could even be impacted.  We are committed to continuing to work closely with our federal, state, local, and private sector partners to counter this threat from China."

According to the indictment, the defendants were engaged in a conspiracy to steal the trade secrets of Micron Technology, Inc. (Micron), a leader in the global semiconductor industry specializing in the advanced research, development, and manufacturing of memory products, including dynamic random-access memory (DRAM).  DRAM is a leading-edge memory storage device used in computer electronics.  Micron is the only United States-based company that manufactures DRAM.  According to the indictment, Micron maintains a significant competitive advantage in this field due in large part from its intellectual property, including its trade secrets that include detailed, confidential information pertaining to the design, development, and manufacturing of advanced DRAM products. 

Prior to the events described in the indictment, the PRC did not possess DRAM technology, and the Central Government and State Council of the PRC publicly identified the development of DRAM and other microelectronics technology as a national economic priority.  The criminal defendants are United Microelectronics Corporation (“UMC”), a Taiwan semiconductor foundry; Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit, Co., Ltd. (“Jinhua'”), a state-owned enterprise of the PRC; and three Taiwan nationals: Chen Zhengkun, a.k.a. Stephen Chen, age 55; He Jianting, a.k.a. J.T. Ho, age 42; and Wang Yungming, a.k.a. Kenny Wang, age 44.   UMC is a publicly listed semiconductor foundry company traded on the New York Stock Exchange; is headquartered in Taiwan; and has offices worldwide, including in Sunnyvale, California.  UMC mass produces integrated-circuit logic products based on designs and technology developed and provided by its customers.  Jinhua is a state-owned enterprise of the PRC, funded entirely by the Chinese government, and established in February 2016 for the sole purpose of designing, developing, and manufacturing DRAM.

According to the indictment, Chen was a General Manager and Chairman of an electronics corporation that Micron acquired in 2013.  Chen then became the president of a Micron subsidiary in Taiwan, Micron Memory Taiwan (“MMT”), responsible for manufacturing at least one of Micron’s DRAM chips.  Chen resigned from MMT in July 2015 and began working at UMC almost immediately.  While at UMC, Chen arranged a cooperation agreement between UMC and Fujian Jinhua whereby, with funding from Fujian Jinhua, UMC would transfer DRAM technology to Fujian Jinhua to mass-produce.  The technology would be jointly shared by both UMC and Fujian Jinhua.  Chen later became the President of Jinhua and was put in charge of its DRAM production facility.

While at UMC, Chen recruited numerous MMT employees, including Ho and Wang, to join him at UMC.  Prior to leaving MMT, Ho and Wang both stole and brought to UMC several Micron trade secrets related to the design and manufacture of DRAM.  Wang downloaded over 900 Micron confidential and proprietary files before he left MMT and stored them on USB external hard drives or in personal cloud storage, from where he could access the technology while working at UMC. 

An indictment merely alleges that crimes have been committed, and all defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. If convicted, the individual defendants face a maximum sentence of 15 years imprisonment and a $5,000,000 fine for economic espionage charges, and 10 years imprisonment for theft of trade secrets charges.  If convicted, each company faces forfeiture and a maximum fine of more than $20 billion.  However, any sentence following conviction would be imposed by the court only after consideration of the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and the federal statute governing the imposition of a sentence, 18 U.S.C. § 3553. 

美国打压中国高科技公司之心从来不死，这是在打压华为、中兴、大疆、阿里、中国电信之后，美国打压中国高科技企业的又一案例。

中美关系已经是成为互相竞争的关系，贸易战不是单纯的贸易战；在高科技领域，中美也正在进行博弈。不过，据《经济学人》杂志最新文章报道，二十一世纪将会是中国的世纪，中国高科技的崛起已经在路上，中国的世纪已经在路上这是事实，美国打压也是没用的，因为中美科技较量的时间在中国这边，而时间正是美国最惧怕的。

从1990到2017，中国人均GDP增长高达903%：

从1990到2015，中国的贫困人口在下降，中国每年申请新专利占世界的比重在持续上升：

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