The United States has tightened trade restrictions against China and Yangtze Memory Technologies Co., (YMTC), China’s largest domestic flash memory supplier. The restrictions could reportedly harm YMTC’s trades.
Analysts believe the ban will impede YMTC’s production and advanced memory chip capabilities, and may even cause it to lose access to advanced chip-making equipment because Japanese and Dutch providers may soon be required to comply with US sanctions. To top it all off, it has caused growing scepticism among NAND flash buyers outside of China about adopting its technology.
In mid-October, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) placed YMTC on its Unverified List (UVL). This is because YMTC was thought to be “at significant risk of being or becoming involved in activities contrary to the United States’ national security or foreign policy interests.”
The regulations would prohibit US companies from shipping goods to some of the blacklisted companies without first obtaining a special licence. The restrictions were imposed after the US claimed that YMTC posed a national security threat, including by assisting in the powering of artificial intelligence technology and hypersonic missiles.
The actions will protect US national security by limiting Beijing’s ability to “leverage artificial intelligence, advanced computing, and other powerful, commercially available technologies for military modernization and human rights abuses,” according to Alan Estevez, Commerce Undersecretary for Industry and Security, in a press release.
The sources for this piece include an article in TheRegister.