The U.S. first changed export rules on the Chinese chip industry in 2020 when it issued a ban against any foundry that uses American technology to manufacture chips. These foundries were not allowed to ship any advanced 5G chips to Huawei. After shipping the Mate 40 series with 5G support in 2020, Huawei could not ship another 5G-enabled flagship until last year when SMIC used its older Deep Ultraviolet (DUV) Lithography machines to create the 7nm Kirin 9000s for the Mate 60 line; this action enraged U.S. lawmakers.
ASML is blocked by the U.S. and the Dutch from shipping EUV Lithography machines to Chinese foundries. | Image credit-ASM.
The new export controls include banning shipments of high bandwidth memory chips used for AI training, and new sanctions on 24 additional chipmaking tools and three software tools. The new export controls also block shipments of chipmaking equipment from Singapore and Malaysia to China. In addition, 140 companies will be added to the U.S. entity list; companies on this list, which already include Huawei and SMIC, are not allowed to purchase supplies from U.S. companies without a license from the Commerce Department.
