China Held Emergency Meetings With Semiconductor Companies After Biden's Curbs: Report

China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has reportedly convened a series of emergency meetings over the past week with leading semiconductor companies to assess the damage from the Biden administration’s chip restrictions and pledge support for the critical sector.

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What Happened: The technology overseer called executives from companies including Yangtze Memory Technologies Co. and Dawning Information Industry Co. into closed-door meetings since the U.S. announced the measures, reported Bloomberg.

Officials from the ministry appeared unsure about the way forward. While they did not provide any clue regarding possible counter-measures, they did stress the fact that the domestic IT market would provide sufficient demand for the affected companies to continue operating, the report added.

YMTC denied it had participated in the emergency meetings, according to Reuters, calling the report "false and sinister" and damaging to its corporate image. The company also said the report would have serious adverse effects on the semiconductor industry environment at home and abroad, as per Reuters.

Sanctions imposed by the Biden administration prevent the export of chip manufacturing tools and design software and forbid top companies like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. TSM and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd SSNLF from producing cutting-edge chips for Chinese businesses.

The sanctions also require any U.S. citizen working in the Chinese semiconductor industry to quit their job or risk losing their U.S. citizenship.

ASML Holding NV ASML, one of the world’s most important semiconductor toolmakers, told U.S. employees to stop servicing Chinese customers.

Expert Take: Jordan Schneider, a senior analyst at Rhodium Group, tweeted on Oct. 17 that Joe Biden's new chip export controls are a huge blow to the CCP's science and technology ambitions.

“Regardless of how much Washington may want American firms to continue working with Chinese companies on lagging-edge chips, Beijing will see the decision to try to freeze Chinese domestic manufacturing above a defined level of technological advancement as deeply provocative,” Schneider had tweeted.

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