Congress moves to strip the DoC of chip-export discretion with the MATCH Act — DUV lithography machines among those targeted in chipmaking tool crackdown
Congress wants to write semiconductor export controls into law.
A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers introduced the Multilateral Alignment of Technology Controls on Hardware Act, or MATCH Act, in early April, targeting the sale and servicing of advanced chipmaking equipment to China.
The bill, filed as H.R. 8170 in the House and with a companion in the Senate, would impose country-wide prohibitions on exports of DUV lithography systems to China, designate five Chinese semiconductor firms as restricted entities by statute, and give U.S. allies 150 days to adopt equivalent controls before Washington expands the Foreign Direct Product Rule unilaterally.
Still in the committee stage, the bill, which has drawn broad congressional support, has since been amended to remove a blanket ban on cryogenic etch tools, though core proposals remain intact.
Two mechanisms of restriction
The MATCH Act builds its controls on two independent mechanisms. The first is a country-wide prohibition on exports of specific "chokepoint" manufacturing equipment to any destination in China, regardless of end user. Named in the original Bill were DUV immersion lithography systems and cryogenic etch tools, but a recent amendment dropped the latter entirely, leaving DUV lithography tools as the sole country-wide prohibition.
That covers ASML’s NXT:2000i-class scanners and Nikon’s NSR-S631E, which are widely used by Chinese chipmaker SMIC in its 7nm production lines. China has no domestic equivalent for volume manufacturing; SMEE’s SSA/800-10W scanner remains unconfirmed in production use.
The second mechanism names five Chinese companies directly in statute: SMIC, CXMT, YMTC, Hua Hong, and Huawei. All of their fabs, facilities, subsidiaries, and affiliates would be classified as “Covered Facilities” and subject to a presumption-of-denial licensing regime extending beyond equipment sales to servicing, spare parts, and technical support for already-installed tools.
While the Bureau of Industry and Security’s Entity List currently restricts SMIC (since 2020), Huawei (since 2019), and YMTC (since 2022), it requires Commerce Department officials to evaluate each subsidiary or affiliate on a case-by-case basis and grants the executive branch discretion to approve licenses. Codifying restrictions against these and other Chinese entities into law would eliminate that discretion, meaning that a subsidiary spun off next year or a joint venture created under a different name would be automatically covered.
U.S. Representative Michael Baumgartner (R-WA), who introduced the Bill, says that the legislation closes loopholes that Chinese firms have been exploiting through front companies and third-country routing.
The Chairman of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, Representative John Moolenaar (R-MI), co-sponsored the bill alongside Democrats including Representatives Jared Golden (D-ME), John Mannion (D-NY), Josh Riley (D-NY), Maggie Goodlander (D-NH), and Suhas Subramanyam (D-VA).
Meanwhile, the Senate companion was introduced by Foreign Relations Chairman Jim Risch (R-ID), Senator Pete Ricketts (R-NE), and Senator Andy Kim (D-NJ), with Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer joining as a co-sponsor.
150 days for multilateral coordination
MATCH's enforcement mechanism is built around a deadline for multilateral coordination. Within 60 days of enactment, the Departments of Commerce, State, Defense, and Treasury, along with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, must identify all covered equipment and facilities. Commerce then has 150 days to negotiate equivalent country-wide controls with allied supplier nations, principally the Netherlands and Japan, home to ASML and Tokyo Electron.
If those negotiations fail, the bill directs Commerce to expand the Foreign Direct Product Rule to cover any foreign-manufactured tool that incorporates U.S.-origin software, technology, or components. In practice, this would function as a near-zero de minimis threshold (meaning that goods would be liable for customs duties and formal entry procedures), since virtually every advanced chipmaking tool in the world relies on some U.S.-origin intellectual property in its EDA software, metrology subsystems, or process control algorithms.
The Netherlands and Japan have so far declined to comment publicly on the bill, but both countries tightened their own export controls in 2023 and 2024 following U.S. pressure. Neither, however, has adopted restrictions as broad as what MATCH proposes.
The FDPR expansion could prove to be a sticking point, which, if enacted, would give the U.S. the ability to block sales of equipment manufactured entirely outside the United States, by non-U.S. companies, to non-U.S. customers, based on embedded U.S. technology. That extraterritorial reach has historically been a point of tension with allied governments, and the explicit statutory deadline could force a confrontation that the executive branch has so far managed to defer through diplomatic channels.
Interestingly, the bill’s sponsors circulated a revised draft on April 16th that removes two provisions that had drawn significant opposition. The country-wide ban on cryogenic etch equipment, dominated by Lam Research and Tokyo Electron, was dropped entirely, while the automatic presumption of denial on licenses to service equipment installed inside Covered Facilities was also softened — however, this revision hasn’t yet appeared on Congress.gov.
That cryogenic etch concession is narrower than it appears, however, given that existing BIS rules already restrict cryogenic etch tools when destined for advanced-node fabs, defined as sub-16/14nm logic, sub-18nm DRAM, and 128-layer-and-above NAND. The DUV immersion lithography restrictions survived in full, as did everything related to Covered Facilities, the 150-day alignment deadline, and the FDPR expansion authority. The five named Chinese firms also remain in the bill without modification.
Executive discretion vs. statutory mandate
The biggest change with the MATCH Act is the transfer of authority from the executive branch to Congress, not that Congress’s authority appears to matter to the incumbent administration.
Since October 2022, U.S. semiconductor export controls have been administered entirely through BIS rulemakings under the Export Control Reform Act of 2018. Those rules can be tightened or loosened by any administration without congressional approval, and each new rule requires a fresh assessment of each entity, each subsidiary, each end use.
MATCH would lock the five named firms and the DUV lithography machine ban into statute, meaning any future relaxation would require an act of Congress to implement. For Applied Materials, Lam Research, and KLA, which booked a combined $19 billion in China revenue in 2025 despite direct U.S.-to-China shipments falling 34%, the bill introduces a layer of permanence that executive-branch rulemaking doesn’t.
ASML, which drew around 30% of its total 2025 revenue from China, faces a different challenge because the servicing restrictions in the original bill threatened the company's maintenance contracts for scanners already operating in Chinese fabs. While the April 16th revision eased that pressure, the FDPR expansion authority could eventually reach tools manufactured at ASML's Veldhoven headquarters if the Netherlands doesn’t adopt matching controls within the 150-day window.
At present, the Bill’s path through Congress remains uncertain; HR 8170 sits in House Foreign Affairs, and the Senate version has been referred to Banking and Foreign Relations. No committee has yet scheduled a markup, and equipment makers that derive 30% or more of their revenue from China are bound to lobby hard against it. But the bipartisan coalition behind the Bill is difficult to dismiss, and current trade tensions between the U.S. and China have narrowed the political runway for opposing new restrictions.
Luke James is a freelance writer and journalist. Although his background is in legal, he has a personal interest in all things tech, especially hardware and microelectronics, and anything regulatory.