The MATCH Act, the Multilateral Alignment of Technology Controls on Hardware bill introduced in the United States Congress in early April, is being read in Brussels and The Hague through the wrong lens. The default European reading is that broader US export controls on deep ultraviolet lithography would weaken American influence over China by accelerating Chinese capacity build-out. That reading is half right and entirely wrong-direction-of-travel for European policy.
The bill, as drafted, would extend US export-control reach into older DUV systems sold by ASML, Tokyo Electron and others. The economic surface affected is wider than the EUV-only carve-outs that have dominated headlines since 2023. ASML's CEO told investors two weeks ago that the company's order book is "outpacing supply", which sounds like a position of strength, and is not.
The structural point is that ASML is the only EUV supplier in the world, and one of three credible DUV suppliers. The Dutch government's negotiating weight in trilateral export-control talks should be proportionate to that monopoly. It is not. Each successive round of US-led control has been negotiated in Washington, signed in The Hague after the fact, and presented to Brussels as a coordination outcome rather than a co-decision. The MATCH Act, if passed, will follow the same template.
Europe's chip sovereignty conversation has spent five years on capacity, the European Chips Act, and on which fab gets which subsidy. The stronger instrument has always been export-control governance, and Europe has used it almost not at all. The MATCH Act's drafting moment is the right moment to put that on the table. The Hague has the standing to do it. Whether the new Dutch coalition has the appetite is the open question.
Until that conversation begins, the headline read on each new round of US restrictions, that they sharpen American influence, will be repeated in European editorials and absorbed in European policy without examination. It is the wrong read. They sharpen the bind that ties the most strategically important European industrial asset to a regulatory orbit Europe does not control. That is the case to make in Brussels, not the case against.
Comments
Sign in to join the conversation. Be civil, be specific, link your sources.