Spy case erupts on eve of Ma-Xi summit
By Matthew Strong
Taiwan News, Staff Writer
2015-11-06 07:16 PM
TAIPEI (Taiwan News) – Seven Taiwanese citizens were preparing to sell secrets from Win Semiconductors Corporation to China, reports said Friday, on the eve of the first-ever summit between the presidents of the two countries.
President Ma Ying-jeou was scheduled to travel to Singapore on Saturday for an unprecedented meeting and a dinner with Chinese leader Xi Jinping later that day.
Prosecutors in Taoyuan City had uncovered a plan by seven engineers, led by a man surnamed Yang, to take confidential business information from Win and hand it over during a trip to China planned for next week. The conspirators would reportedly receive NT$2 million (US$61,500) each as well as payments equaling five times their annual salary, reports said.
Yang, 44, worked as an engineer for a semiconductor company in China, but through headhunters and other means, he established close ties with former and present engineers at Win, prosecutors said.
The investigators acted early on Friday because they had realized Yang and three others were planning to leave Taiwan for China next Monday. They raided several locations in Miaoli and Hsinchu, where they also detained suspects, reports said.
Win is reportedly one of the top companies in its sector, while its products are used in cell phones, wireless and military radar systems. Yang was planning to help several of his co-conspirators find work at Chinese firms, reports said.
It was not immediately clear who in China would take delivery of the confidential data from Win, reports said.
