Corruption Probes Spread To Chipmaker Executives. Is This China's Retaliation Against The West?

Tudor Brown, the former president of Softbank Group Corp SFTBY Arm Ltd, has resigned from the board of Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC) after nine years, Bloomberg reports.
The U.S. recently imposed sanctions on the leading Chinese chipmaker.
"Bittersweet day today. After 9 years, I resigned from SMIC board. The international divide has further widened," his LinkedIn profile read.
Also Read: China's Regulatory Crackdown On Its Tech Sector Takes New Twist
Brown, who's also a director at Lenovo Group Ltd LNVGY, was a key executive at Arm from 1990 till May 2012, before SoftBank scooped the British firm in 2016.
Meanwhile, China investigated three former executives connected to the National Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund, called the "Big Fund," which raised $51 billion in its last two funding rounds, Financial Times reports.
China probed Du Yang, former director at SINO IC Capital, which managed the Big Fund's assets, for "suspected serious violations of disciplines and laws."
China also investigated two former investment managers at SINO IC Capital, Yang Zhengfan and Liu Yang.
China put at least five chip fund executives under probe for fraud in the past two months.
Beijing is under pressure to fast-track its semiconductor industry as growing U.S. restrictions threaten its chip supply chain.
The U.S. Commerce Department weighed banning exports of chipmaking tools to those Chinese factories manufacturing advanced semiconductors to impede China's growing dominance in state-of-the-art chips.
The U.S. added SMIC to a trade blacklist over alleged military ties in 2020.
Shares of Chinese chipmakers rallied amid brewing Sino-American tensions, expecting Beijing to step up support for domestic firms to bolster the critical technology.

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