China's commerce ministry on Saturday warned that fresh clashes between Nexperia's Netherlands-based parent and its China-based unit raise the prospect of another global semiconductor production and supply chain emergency. The statement pointed to recent developments in the corporate conflict as heightening the risk of renewed disruption.
The ministry's alert follows an earlier episode in October when Beijing imposed export controls on Chinese-made Nexperia chips after a legal move in the Netherlands transferred the firm from its Chinese parent, Wingtech, to new control in Amsterdam. That action at the time interrupted production across the global auto sector, because Nexperia's semiconductors are widely used in vehicle electronic systems.
Although diplomatic engagement helped ease the chip shortage that followed, the underlying dispute between Nexperia's Dutch headquarters and its China operations has hardened. The Dutch entity has backed efforts to remove Wingtech's control, while the China-based arm has demanded the restoration of Wingtech's authority. According to the commerce ministry, this clash has not diminished but intensified.
The ministry's statement, published on its official website, said the situation had been aggravated by a specific IT action. A day earlier, Nexperia's Chinese packaging arm accused the Netherlands-based headquarters of disabling office accounts for all staff in China. "(This has) provoked new conflicts and created new difficulties and obstacles for (company-to-company) negotiations," the ministry said, citing the impact on talks between the two sides.
The ministry went further to say that "Nexperia Netherlands has seriously disrupted the company’s normal production and operation, and if this triggers a global semiconductor production and supply chain crisis again, the Netherlands must bear full responsibility for this."
On Friday, Nexperia's Dutch entity neither denied that an IT action took place nor accepted the Chinese unit's claim that the move affected manufacturing. The Netherlands-based company disputed the allegation that production at the assembly and testing facility in Guangdong province had been impacted.
The dispute has its roots in September when the Chinese subsidiary declared itself independent after Wingtech's control was removed. Since then, the Dutch headquarters and the China-based unit have exchanged accusations of negotiating in bad faith, and the Dutch parent has suspended wafer shipments to the Guangdong plant.
Attempts to mediate the impasse - involving Beijing, The Hague, and Brussels - have so far failed to produce a resolution. Beijing has criticized The Hague for not doing enough to force a compromise from Nexperia's Netherlands headquarters or to halt the Amsterdam court proceedings that led to Wingtech's shares being transferred to a Dutch lawyer in October.
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