WASHINGTON: The US is turning up the heat on China’s top sanctioned chipmaker by cutting off its most advanced factory from more American imports after it produced a sophisticated chip for Huawei’s Mate 60 Pro phone.
Late last year, the Commerce Department sent dozens of letters to American suppliers to Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp, suspending permission to sell to its most advanced plant, according to US media reports.
While many firms had already stopped selling to SMIC South, as the unit is known, the letters halted millions of dollars worth of shipments of chipmaking materials and parts from at least 1 supplier, Entegris.
Entegris said it made the shipments in accordance with a valid export license and halted them when it received letters from the Commerce Department suspending permission to send products to SMIC South.
The Massachusetts-based firm, which produces chemicals, filters, gases, and products for handling wafers, the building blocks for making chips, said it was monitoring the rapidly evolving regulatory requirements for global trade affecting the chip industry.
China terms move economic bullying
A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Washington said that this was a complete economic bullying and will inevitably backfire.
The spokesperson urged US to stop overstretching the concept of national security and abusing the state power to suppress Chinese firms.
The license suspensions by the US Commerce Department showed the Biden administration has taken action against SMIC amid growing pressure from Republican China hawks to stem the flow of US technology to the firm and degrade its ability to make sophisticated chips.
