China reportedly recruiting engineers in South Korea to counter U.S. chip sanctions

According to BusinessKorea, Chinese semiconductor companies are recruiting engineers in South Korea to strengthen the country's semiconductor supply chain in response to US sanctions.

A Korean headhunting company is looking for semiconductor etching experts for a Chinese company. The job advertisement says that they are looking for engineers with a master's degree or above who have worked as section chiefs in fields such as etching or plasma implantation. Etching is the process of drawing patterns on semiconductor circuits, and its importance has increased as semiconductor production processes have recently been miniaturized to the nanometer level. Plasma implantation refers to coating a thin film on the surface of a semiconductor. In addition to etching, it is also used in deposition, ion implantation and cleaning processes.

On another job posting site, seeking 10 nano DDR4 DRAM designers, the ad explicitly states: “We will give preferential treatment to former engineers from Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.” The ad also lists special working conditions such as top wages, good housing and guarantees of international schools for workers’ children.

"I understand that Chinese companies are trying to contact employees at Samsung Electronics' NAND flash plant in Xi'an, China, and SK Hynix's DRAM plant in Wuxi to ensure the safety of semiconductor human resources. Korean workers are fully aware of the risks of transferring to Chinese companies, but this does not mean they will never transfer to Chinese companies," said a Korean industry observer.

Industry insiders said that China prefers Korean employees in the memory industry, as well as Taiwanese employees in fabless and foundry industries.

With the recent expansion of U.S. sanctions against Huawei to restrict the supply of memory semiconductors such as DRAM and NAND flash memory, Chinese authorities are feeling a great sense of crisis. Since both Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix use equipment from U.S. semiconductor companies such as KLA, LAM Research and Applied Materials, they must comply with U.S. regulatory requirements.