cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/10269423

Beijing consults companies on ways to stop west acquiring its advanced technologies and star start-ups.

Archived version

Chinese regulators are considering tightening export controls on artificial intelligence and semiconductor technologies, as the US-China rivalry intensifies in cutting-edge AI.

Regulators led by the Ministry of Commerce (MofCom) have been consulting leading domestic AI and chipmaking groups on how to prevent China’s advanced technologies and star start-ups from being acquired by the west, according to two people involved in the discussions.

MofCom talked to AI companies including Alibaba, ByteDance and Zhipu on limiting the transfer of key data for the training of their models overseas, as well as allowing their model weights to be downloaded by foreign users, the people said.

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MofCom has also sought views on possible restrictions that would prevent overseas chipmakers including Qualcomm and TSMC from producing advanced semiconductors based on designs developed by Chinese companies such as Huawei, Alibaba and ByteDance, according to the people.

Potential restrictions could also be imposed on the overseas acquisition of strategic technology groups in areas such as agentic AI, the people said. This is mainly to address a loophole that Beijing believes to have led to Meta’s $2bn acquisition of Manus, a deal that was subsequently ordered to be unwound by Chinese authorities.

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