A US Export Rule Split Nexperia in Two: Dutch Court Probe, Chinese Asset Freeze and a Deal With India's Tata

On 29 September 2025 the US Commerce Department extended its export controls to any company at least 50% owned by a listed entity. One of the companies caught was Wingtech, the Chinese owner of Nexperia, a Dutch maker of basic car chips. Within days the Dutch government had taken control of the company, and within a week China had blocked its exports. A year later, Nexperia is effectively two companies.

On 17 September 2026 Nexperia signed a framework agreement with Tata Electronics to make chips in India: wafer fabrication at Dholera in Gujarat, assembly and testing in Assam. No volumes or dates were announced. A year ago Nexperia was a single Dutch company owned by a Chinese group. Now its European side is looking for new places to make chips, because it can no longer rely on its own factories in China.

Nexperia makes the simplest chips in a car: transistors and diodes. It holds close to 40% of the market for those parts. That’s why a governance fight in The Hague became, within weeks, a supply crisis for carmakers. It’s also the clearest case yet of what happens when one company is caught between governments.

How the company broke

The chain of events began in Washington. On 29 September 2025 the US Commerce Department extended its export controls to any company at least 50% owned by a listed entity. That caught Wingtech, Nexperia’s Chinese parent. The next day the Dutch government took control of Nexperia under the Goods Availability Act, a 1952 emergency law. Amsterdam’s Enterprise Chamber, a specialist company court, suspended Wingtech’s chief executive Zhang Xuezheng from his role and put Wingtech’s votes under an independent administrator.

China answered on 4 October by banning exports from Nexperia’s Chinese plants. Most of the company’s chips are finished there. Honda halted its plant in Mexico on 28 October. China exempted civilian Nexperia exports on 9 November, the US suspended its 50% rule for a year on 10 November, and on 19 November the Dutch minister suspended the state’s control order.

The governments stepped back. The company didn’t come back together.

Two Nexperias

The Dutch side is now run by an interim chief executive, Stefan Tilger, under court supervision. In February 2026 the Enterprise Chamber found valid grounds to doubt the company had been properly managed, ordered a formal investigation and kept the measures in place. No result has been published.

The Chinese side is going its own way. Its operations, centred on a packaging plant in Dongguan and accounting for about 70% of Nexperia’s global output, kept running on stockpiles, customer wafers and domestic suppliers. In August 2026 it said it would move its whole product line onto Chinese 12-inch wafers. That would cut its last dependence on the European fabs.

Wingtech, meanwhile, is fighting in Chinese courts. In May 2026 it sued under China’s Anti-Foreign Sanctions Law, asking for control back and ¥8 billion in damages. In late August a court in Dongguan froze ¥2.14 billion, about $318 million, of equity in Nexperia’s Chinese subsidiaries until 2029. Nexperia says daily operations aren’t affected. Wingtech itself lost ¥8.7 billion in 2025 and has been under a delisting warning since May.

What governments learned

Each government used a tool that made sense on its own. Washington tightened ownership rules to close a loophole. The Hague used an emergency law to protect a strategic company. Beijing used export bans to protect a Chinese owner. Together they split a company that served the whole car industry.

The suspensions show all three saw the cost. Still, nobody has put Nexperia back together, and the Dutch side is now building supply outside China while the Chinese side builds supply outside Europe.

That’s decoupling in practice. Governments rarely order it. It happens when legal systems pull one firm in two directions until each half settles where it can operate. For other companies with Chinese owners and European operations, Nexperia is now the case study their lawyers read first.