Two men in France charged with selling chip technology secrets to China

A man and a woman suspected of selling top-secret Qatari chip technology to China and Russia have been formally charged in France.
According to France Internationale Radio, on December 1, the French National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office said that a man and a woman involved in the sale of chip technology to China have been charged with conspiracy and a crime punishable by up to 10 years in prison and are under surveillance by the Justice Department. The lawyer for the people involved in the case declined to answer reporters’ questions about the case.
The case, which involves French semiconductor technology company Ommic, revealed that two French and two Chinese were investigated in Paris in March 2023.
Ommic was acquired in 2018 by a Chinese businessman named Zhang Roden, who used a private fund set up in France to buy 94% of Ommic’s shares and became its chairman. The company is headquartered near Paris and has more than 100 employees at the time. The material it produces can increase the power of semiconductors by dozens of times and was listed as a strategic material by the French Ministry of State in 2021.
It is known that on March 24, 2023, Omik CEO Marc Roche and a Chinese employee of the company were convicted of providing foreign powers with programs, documents and archives that were detrimental to the interests of the state. This crime carries a penalty of 15 years in prison and a fine of 225,000 euros.