China’s our on-line world regulator will conduct a cybersecurity assessment of merchandise bought in the nation by US reminiscence chip producer Micron Technology, the regulator mentioned on Friday.
The transfer, which comes amid a spat over chip expertise between Washington and Beijing, is geared toward defending the safety of the provision chain for vital info infrastructure, stop hidden dangers and safeguard nationwide safety, the Cyberspace Administration of China mentioned in a short assertion.
It gave no different particulars, together with which Micron merchandise it was reviewing.
The United States has imposed a sequence of export controls on chipmaking expertise to China for concern it might be used to produce chips for functions resembling synthetic intelligence which might be utilized by China’s navy, and blacklisted a lot of China’s largest chip corporations, together with Micron rival Yangtze Memory Technologies Co Ltd.
Micron, one of many world’s largest reminiscence chip makers, didn’t reply instantly to a request for remark. The firm’s shares fell 3 % on Friday.
“Punitive actions against Micron could suggest a broader shift in Chinese policy with other US vendors with large Chinese exposure now potentially at risk of similar actions,” Wedbush Securities analyst Matthew Bryson mentioned.
On Friday, Japan introduced it might align its expertise commerce controls with a US push to curb China’s capability to make superior chips. The Netherlands, which makes superior lithography gear vital for the manufacture of superior chips, made an analogous announcement earlier this month.
Weak client demand has roiled the reminiscence chip market, which is dominated by South Korea’s Samsung Electronics.
Micron derives round 10 % of its income from China, but it surely was not clear if the assessment would have an effect on the corporate’s gross sales to non-Chinese prospects in the nation.
The bigger chunk of the corporate’s merchandise flowing into China are being bought by non-Chinese corporations for use in merchandise manufactured in the nation, in accordance to analysts.
Micron has places of work in Shanghai and Shenzhen, in addition to a chip packaging facility in the town of Xian. In early 2022, the corporate introduced it might shut its DRAM design operations in Shanghai.
© Thomson Reuters 2023
