The US government on Thursday added three dozen Chinese firms to its export blacklist, including the country’s top flash memory chip maker, marking Washington’s latest effort to block China from a global hi-tech supply chain that supports the production of advanced military equipment.
In a further blow to China’s embattled semiconductor industry, the US Commerce Department’s decision to put 36 Chinese groups on its Entity List effectively blocks the companies from accessing critical commodities, software and technologies in the US unless their American suppliers gain explicit sales approvals.
“Today we are building on the actions we took in October to protect US national security by severely restricting the PRC’s ability to leverage artificial intelligence, advanced computing, and other powerful, commercially available technologies for military modernisation and human rights abuses,” said Alan Estevez, the US Commerce Department’s industry and security undersecretary, in a statement on Thursday.