[Edaily Reporter SOYEON KIM ] Cutting-edge strategic technologies cannot be dismissed as merely the property of a single company. They are core assets that determine the competitiveness of the national economy and shape the future growth prospects of companies and industries. Particularly in industries like semiconductors, where technological competitiveness directly translates into national competitiveness, the value of technology extends beyond individual companies to the national level.

It takes a tremendous amount of time and money to develop a technology. The process involves investing in research and development for years, followed by repeated trials and errors to refine process conditions and improve yield rates. A company’s technological competitiveness lies not only in the technology itself but also in the experience and know-how accumulated in the process of creating it.

Moreover, no matter how talented an engineer may be, they cannot develop cutting-edge technology entirely on their own. Technology leakage amounts to handing over, in its entirety, the experience that embodies everyone’s efforts and hard work.

The real damage caused by technology leakage is that it allows competitors to completely bypass the years of trial and error and failure that leading companies had to endure. It enables them to narrow the technological gap—built through massive R&D expenditures and manpower—at a relatively lower cost and in less time.

In fact, the “hybrid bonding” technology—which is reported to have been leaked by an SK hynix employee who defected to a Chinese Huawei subsidiary—is a key technology essential for achieving high-layer stacking in next-generation High Bandwidth Memory (HBM). Given its critical role in enabling HBM’s high-layer stacking, this technology could have a direct impact on future semiconductor competitiveness.

It is no exaggeration to say that when SamsungElectronics executives and employees provided the Process Reference Procedure (PRP)—the semiconductor manufacturing recipe for DRAM development—to China’s Changxin Memory Technology (CXMT), they laid the foundation for CXMT to grow into the world’s fourth-largest memory manufacturer. Having a company’s technology—built through blood, sweat, and tears—stolen is tantamount to losing a part of a nation’s competitiveness.

The temptation surrounding technology leaks is growing ever stronger. If the penalties and liabilities for stealing technology are light compared to the profits that can be gained, it will be difficult to eradicate technology theft.

Stealing technology is a serious crime that steals the very future of the nation. If someone misappropriates technology—built up over many years in collaboration with colleagues—for personal gain, thereby accelerating the catch-up efforts of rival nations, they must be held accountable to a degree commensurate with the damage caused. Severe penalties for technology leakage crimes are necessary, if only to protect our technology and maintain our competitive edge.