For the first time in history, Japan's top five chip equipment manufacturers record a 12% plunge in sales to China.

Glonghui June 22｜According to Nikkei Asia, in recent years, as China's domestic semiconductor industry continues to make strides, domestic equipment manufacturers are gradually seizing market share from Japanese and Western competitors, quietly reshaping the global equipment supply landscape. According to financial reports disclosed by the five major Japanese equipment companies—Tokyo Electron, Advantest, SCREEN Group, DISCO, and Hitachi High-Tech—their combined sales in the Chinese market for the last fiscal year totaled 1.47 trillion yen (approximately 58.8 billion RMB), a decline of 12% compared to the previous fiscal year. This marks the first-ever drop in this data on record. Taking Tokyo Electron as an example, in the first quarter of this year, its sales share in the China region fell to 27% of total sales, a decrease of 7 percentage points year-on-year. In the second quarter of 2024, this proportion once reached as high as 50%, highlighting the significant drop. Major European and American equipment manufacturers are also facing pressure in the Chinese market. In the first quarter of this year, the leading global lithography machine maker ASML saw its sales to China fall to 19% of its total, down 8 percentage points year-on-year; U.S. companies such as Applied Materials and KLA are encountering similar challenges.