The United States yesterday launched its third crackdown in three years on China’s semiconductor industry, curbing exports to 140 companies, including chip equipment maker Naura Technology Group, among other moves.
The effort to hobble Beijing’s chipmaking ambitions also hits Chinese chip toolmakers Piotech, ACM Research and SiCarrier Technology with new export restrictions as part of the package, which also takes aim at shipments of advanced memory chips and more chipmaking tools to China.
The move is one of the Biden administration’s last large-scale efforts to stymie China’s ability to access and produce chips that can help advance artificial intelligence for military applications, or otherwise threaten US national security.
It comes just weeks before the swearing-in of Republican President-elect Donald Trump, who is expected to retain many of Biden’s tough-on-China measures.
The package includes curbs on China-bound shipments of high bandwidth memory chips, critical for high-end applications like AI training; new curbs on 24 additional chipmaking tools and three software tools; and new export curbs on chipmaking equipment made in countries such as Singapore and Malaysia.
Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said the action aims to prevent “China from advancing its domestic semiconductor manufacturing system, which it will use to support its military modernisation.”
Reuters first reported many companies involved and key details of the plan.
The tool controls will likely hurt Lam Research, KLA and Applied Materials, as well as non-US companies like Dutch equipment maker ASM International .
Chinese companies facing new restrictions include nearly two dozen semiconductor companies, two investment companies and over 100 chipmaking tool makers.
The companies include Swaysure Technology Co, Si’En Qingdao, and Shenzhen Pensun Technology Co, which work with China’s Huawei Technologies. The telecommunications equipment leader has been hobbled by US sanctions and is now at the center of China’s advanced chip production and development.
They will be added to the entity list, which bars US suppliers from shipping to them without first receiving a special license.
Asked about the US curbs, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said such behaviour undermined the international economic trade order and disrupted global supply chains.
China will take measures to safeguard the rights and interests of its firms, he added at a regular Press briefing yesterday.
China’s commerce ministry described the US restrictions as a clear example of “economic coercion” and “non-market practices,” according to a statement published on its official website after the new curbs were announced.
China has stepped up its drive to become self-sufficient in the semiconductor sector in recent years, as the US and other countries have restricted exports of the advanced chips and the tools to make them. However, it remains years behind chip industry leaders like Nvidia in AI chips and chip equipment maker ASML in the Netherlands.
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