The Trump team is trying to strengthen Joe Biden’s chip controls over China

Donald Trump’s administration outlines tougher versions of American semiconductor borders and prescribes key allies to climb restrictions on the China chip industry, an early hint the new US President intends to expand efforts under Joe Biden to limit technological skill. of Beijing.

Trump officials have recently met with their Japanese and Dutch counterparts on the restriction of Tokyo Electron Ltd. and ASML who own NV engineers to keep semiconductor tools in China, according to people familiar with this problem. The purpose, which was also a priority for Biden, is to see the key allies that match China Curbs that the US placed on American gasket companies, including Lam Research Corp., Kla Corp. and Applied Materials Inc.

The meetings come to the early discussions in Washington on sanctions on certain Chinese companies, other people said.

Some Trump officials also intend to continue restricting the type of NVIDIA body tokens that can be exported to China without a license, Bloomberg News has previously reported. They also have early conversations about strengthening the existing borders on the amount of chips that can be exported globally without a license, some of the people said, who have not been identified, because deliberations are private.

Actions to Japanese chip companies decreased according to Bloomberg News’s report, driven by the 4.4% slide of Tokyo Electron.

The wide goal in Washington is to prevent China from further developing an internal semiconductor industry to increase its military and military capabilities – and Trump seems to lift where Biden left. In some fields, this means to follow agreements with allies who have never completed the previous administration. In others, it means adopting the priorities of the more unpleasant members of Biden’s team, who could not build the internal consensus on their more aggressive policy objectives.

A white house representative did not immediately respond to a comment request. The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Trade and the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry have refused to comment.

It could take months before the discussions produce new US regulations because Trump makes staff decisions at key federal agencies. It also remains to be seen if the allies will be more receptive to the new Washington leadership. The previous administration has reached a hand shaking agreement with the Hague on limiting the maintenance of the gear in China, but the Dutchman offended after Trump won the elections, two senior officials of Biden said. Without regular maintenance and maintenance, ASML chip manufacturing equipment and others may quickly lose the ability to respond to rigorous semiconductor production.

Biden’s team also sent several other priorities to Trump’s national security council officials, said one of these officials, and the new team was receptive. A key measure is the blocking of Chinese memory chip Changxin Memory Technologies Inc. Since the purchase of American Technology, a step that Biden officials have been considering, but eventually they have not watched because of the opposition in Japan.

Some Trump’s team officials also want to intensify the restrictions on the Manufacturing International Corp., the main partner for making the Chinese Telecommunications Gigant Technologies Co. Biden has actually blocked transports to some SMIC facilities, but have set a review for others for others, which those worries could allow SMIC to purchase tools that are ultimately used in restricted installations. SMIC shares deleted high losses to win up to 2.7% in Hong Kong, partly from Beijing’s support expectations.

The new administration is also a look at the sales of chips that Nvidia has designed especially for China, Bloomberg reported. Some of Biden’s NSC officials wanted to impose those closer measures before leaving the position, several people said, but the secretary of trade, Gina Raimondo, refused to follow them.

Then, there is the so-called Diffusion rule, imposed in the last week of Biden’s term. The measure divided the world into three levels of countries and has set maximum thresholds for the computing power that can be shipped to each. It has also established mechanisms for companies to validate the security of their projects and access higher calculation limits.

The rule, which will have an impact on the developments of data centers from everywhere in South -East to the Middle East, has attracted a harsh reprimand from companies, including NVIDIA, where executive director Jensen Huang and expressed optimism that the Trump VA administration opt for a lighter regulatory note.

The White House discusses how to make that framework more efficient and strengthen, according to several people familiar with conversations, although what it involves is still in flow.

An idea favored by some of the administration would be the reduction of the computing power that can be exported without a license. According to current restrictions, chip producers should only announce the Government before exporting the equivalent of up to 1,700 graphic processing units in most countries. Some Trump officials want to reduce this threshold, people said familiar with the problem, which would extend the scope of the license requirement.

(Except for the title, this story was not edited by NDTV staff and is published from a union feed.)