Restricting Chip Sales to China Could Backfire on U.S., Industry Group Says
The Biden administration’s potential curbs on sales of advanced semiconductors to China could undermine huge new government investments in domestic chip-making, the U.S. chip-industry trade group said Monday. The Biden administration is considering a raft of new curbs on the sale of chips to China, aiming to disrupt Beijing’s use of artificial intelligence for hacking and weapons development.
At the same time, the administration is rolling out $39 billion in grants for new U.S. chip-making plants after the passage of the Chips Act last year. “Allowing the industry to have continued access to the China market, the world’s largest commercial market for commodity semiconductors, is important to avoid undermining the positive impact of this effort," the Semiconductor Industry Association, the Washington, D.C.
industry body, said in a written statement. U.S. chip companies have long argued that the government should carefully weigh the impact of export restrictions, because sales in China support investments in the U.S.
and help fund research that sustains their technological edge. Chip companies, including the AI-chip leader Nvidia, have been lobbying the administration to refrain from stricter export controls after a ratcheting-up of tensions between the U.S. and China that has centered on the semiconductor and electric-vehicle industries.
Nvidia’s chief financial officer warned of a “permanent loss of opportunities for the U.S. industry" in China if sales of AI chips were prohibited. Restrictions the SIA described as overly broad, ambiguous and at times unilateral “risk diminishing the U.S.
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