US President Joe Biden’s administration is weighing sanctions on several Chinese tech companies, including memory chipmaker Changxin Xinqiao Memory Technologies Inc (CXMT, 長鑫新橋) in a fresh bid to restrain Beijing’s development of advanced semiconductors, people familiar with the matter said.
The US Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) is considering adding CXMT to its so-called Entity List, which restricts companies’ access to US technology, the sources said.
The BIS is also considering restricting five other Chinese firms, they said, adding that the list is not final.
Photo: Reuters
CXMT makes chips used in a wide range of products, including computer servers and smart vehicles. It competes with US-based Micron Technology Inc and South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co and SK Hynix Inc. Micron funded an advocacy group that has long pushed for CXMT to be restricted.
The BIS and White House National Security Council declined to comment.
“We actively endorse and promote free and fair competition,” CXMT said in a statement. “Our commitment to this principle is demonstrated by our strict compliance with all relevant laws and regulations, including US export regulations.”
The company said that its chips were used in “everyday consumer products, with a specific focus on civilian and commercial applications.”
The potential sanctions are a response by the Biden administration to a chip breakthrough that Huawei Technologies Co (華為) made last year, US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Michael McCaul said in an interview last week.
The US department is weighing a sanctions package on multiple firms, McCaul said, without naming CXMT.
Huawei launched a 5G phone last year with an advanced 7-nanometer semiconductor made in China. It was lauded as a significant breakthrough considering that the administration of former US president Donald Trump cut off Huawei’s access to leading global chipmakers in 2020 over national security concerns. The handset signaled that the country’s chip industry was further along than expected.
The Biden administration has stepped up use of the department’s Entity List to keep Chinese companies from obtaining the latest US technologies. US suppliers are blocked from selling certain advanced products, equipment and components to customers on the list unless they obtain a special license from the US Department of Commerce.
Several key Chinese tech companies are already subject to those sanctions, including Shenzhen-based Huawei, its chipmaking partner Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (中芯國際) and lithography machine maker Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group (上海微電子). In 2022, Yangtze Memory Technologies Co (長江儲存科技) was added to the list.
Beyond the blacklisting, the US is urging allies to work more closely together to contain China’s rise. The Biden administration is pressing the Netherlands, Germany, South Korea and Japan to further tighten restrictions on China’s access to semiconductor technology.
SEEKING CLARITY: Washington should not adopt measures that create uncertainties for ‘existing semiconductor investments,’ TSMC said referring to its US$165 billion in the US Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) told the US that any future tariffs on Taiwanese semiconductors could reduce demand for chips and derail its pledge to increase its investment in Arizona. “New import restrictions could jeopardize current US leadership in the competitive technology industry and create uncertainties for many committed semiconductor capital projects in the US, including TSMC Arizona’s significant investment plan in Phoenix,” the chipmaker wrote in a letter to the US Department of Commerce. TSMC issued the warning in response to a solicitation for comments by the department on a possible tariff on semiconductor imports by US President Donald Trump’s
The government has launched a three-pronged strategy to attract local and international talent, aiming to position Taiwan as a new global hub following Nvidia Corp’s announcement that it has chosen Taipei as the site of its Taiwan headquarters. Nvidia cofounder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Monday last week announced during his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei that the Nvidia Constellation, the company’s planned Taiwan headquarters, would be located in the Beitou-Shilin Technology Park (北投士林科技園區) in Taipei. Huang’s decision to establish a base in Taiwan is “primarily due to Taiwan’s talent pool and its strength in the semiconductor
An earnings report from semiconductor giant and artificial intelligence (AI) bellwether Nvidia Corp takes center stage for Wall Street this week, as stocks hit a speed bump of worries over US federal deficits driving up Treasury yields. US equities pulled back last week after a torrid rally, as investors turned their attention to tax and spending legislation poised to swell the US government’s US$36 trillion in debt. Long-dated US Treasury yields rose amid the fiscal worries, with the 30-year yield topping 5 percent and hitting its highest level since late 2023. Stocks were dealt another blow on Friday when US President Donald
UNCERTAINTY: Investors remain worried that trade negotiations with Washington could go poorly, given Trump’s inconsistency on tariffs in his second term, experts said The consumer confidence index this month fell for a ninth consecutive month to its lowest level in 13 months, as global trade uncertainties and tariff risks cloud Taiwan’s economic outlook, a survey released yesterday by National Central University found. The biggest decline came from the timing for stock investments, which plunged 11.82 points to 26.82, underscoring bleak investor confidence, it said. “Although the TAIEX reclaimed the 21,000-point mark after the US and China agreed to bury the hatchet for 90 days, investors remain worried that the situation would turn sour later,” said Dachrahn Wu (吳大任), director of the university’s Research Center for
RSS