{"id":1583798,"date":"2022-08-02T05:39:37","date_gmt":"2022-08-02T09:39:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1583798"},"modified":"2022-08-02T05:39:51","modified_gmt":"2022-08-02T09:39:51","slug":"u-s-considers-crackdown-on-memory-chip-makers-in-china","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/u-s-considers-crackdown-on-memory-chip-makers-in-china\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. considers crackdown on memory chip makers in China"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fu-s-considers-crackdown-on-memory-chip-makers-in-china%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1583798&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>By Alexandra Alper and Karen Freifeld<\/p>\n<p>WASHINGTON (Reuters) \u2013     The United States is considering limiting shipments of American chipmaking equipment to memory chip makers in China including Yangtze Memory Technologies Co Ltd (YMTC), according to\u00a0four people familiar with the matter, part of a bid to halt China\u2019s semiconductor sector advances and protect U.S. companies.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0If President Joe Biden\u2019s administration proceeds with the move, it\u00a0could also hurt South Korean memory chip juggernauts Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and SK Hynix Inc, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity. Samsung has two big factories in China while SK Hynix Inc is buying Intel Corp\u2019s NAND flash memory chips manufacturing business in China. <\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The crackdown, if approved, would involve barring the shipment of U.S. chipmaking equipment to factories in China that manufacture advanced NAND chips. <\/p>\n<p>It would mark the first U.S. bid through export controls to target Chinese production of memory chips without specialized military applications, representing a more expansive view of American national security, according to export control experts. <\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The move also would seek to protect the only U.S. memory chip producers, Western Digital Corp and Micron Technology Inc, which together represent about a quarter of the NAND chips market. <\/p>\n<p>NAND chips store data in devices such as smartphones and personal computers and at data centers for the likes of Amazon, Facebook and Google. How many gigabytes of data a phone or laptop can hold is determined by how many NAND chips it includes and how advanced they are.<\/p>\n<p>\u2002\u2002\u2002\u2002Under the action being considered, U.S. officials would ban the export of tools to China used to make NAND chips with more than 128 layers, according to two of the sources. LAM Research Corp and Applied Materials, both based in Silicon Valley, are the primary suppliers of such tools.<\/p>\n<p>All the sources described the administration\u2019s consideration of the matter as in the early stages, with no proposed regulations yet drafted.<\/p>\n<p>Asked to comment on the possible move, a spokesperson for the Commerce Department, which oversees export controls,\u00a0did not discuss potential restrictions but noted that \u201cthe Biden administration is focused on impairing (China\u2019s) efforts to manufacture advanced semiconductors to address significant national security risks to the United States.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>FAST-GROWING COMPANY<\/p>\n<p>YMTC, founded in 2016, is a rising power in manufacturing NAND chips. Micron and Western Digital are under pressure from YMTC\u2019s low prices, as the White House wrote in a June 2021 report https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/100-day-supply-chain-review-report.pdf. YMTC\u2019s expansion and low-price offerings present \u201ca direct threat\u201d to Micron and Western Digital, that report said. The report described YMTC as China\u2019s \u201cnational champion\u201d and the recipient of some $24 billion in Chinese subsidies. <\/p>\n<p>YMTC, already under investigation by the Commerce Department over whether it violated U.S. export controls by selling chips to Chinese telecoms company Huawei, is in talks with Apple Inc  to supply the top U.S. smartphone maker with flash memory chips, according to a Bloomberg report.<\/p>\n<p>LAM Research Corp, SK Hynix and Micron declined comment on the U.S. policy. Samsung, Applied Materials Inc, YMTC and Western Digital Corp did not immediately respond to requests for comment. <\/p>\n<p>CONGRESS ACTS<\/p>\n<p>Tensions between China and the United States over the tech sector deepened under Biden\u2019s predecessor Donald Trump and have continued since. Reuters\u00a0reported on July 8 that Biden\u2019s administration is also considering restrictions on shipments to China of tools to make advanced logic chips, seeking to hamstring China\u2019s largest chipmaker, SMIC.<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. Congress last week approved legislation aimed at helping the United States compete with China by investing billions of dollars in domestic chip production.<\/p>\n<p>Chipmakers that take money under the measure would be prohibited from building or expanding manufacturing for certain advanced chips, including advanced memory chips at a level to be determined by the administration, in countries including China.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 According to\u00a0Walt Coon of the consulting firm Yole Intelligence, YMTC accounts for about 5% of worldwide NAND flash memory chip production, almost double from a year ago. Western Digital stands at about 13% and Micron 11%. Coon said YMTC would be greatly hurt by restrictions like those that Biden\u2019s administration is contemplating. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf they were stuck at 128, I don\u2019t know how they would really have a path forward,\u201d Coon said.<\/p>\n<p>Production of NAND chips in China has grown to more than 23% of the worldwide total this year from under 14% in 2019, while production in the United States has decreased from 2.3% to 1.6% over the same period, Yole data showed. For the American companies, nearly all of their chip production is done overseas.<\/p>\n<p>It was unclear what impact the potential restrictions might have on other players in China. Intel, which retains\u00a0a contract to manage operations\u00a0in the factory it is selling to SK Hynix in China, is already producing memory chips with 144 layers at the Chinese site, according to an Intel press release.<\/p>\n<p> (Reporting by Alexandra Alper and Karen Freifeld; Additional reporting by Stephen Nellis; Editing by Chris Sanders and Will Dunham)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.oann.com\/u-s-considers-crackdown-on\/file-photo-illustration-picture-of-memory-chips-by-sk-hynix-3\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/tagreuters.com2022binary_LYNXMPEI700O1-VIEWIMAGE.jpg\" alt=\"tagreuters.com2022binary_LYNXMPEI700O1-VIEWIMAGE\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Alexandra Alper and Karen Freifeld WASHINGTON (Reuters) \u2013 The United States is considering limiting shipments of American chipmaking equipment to memory chip makers in China including Yangtze Memory Technologies<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1583798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1583798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1583798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1583798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1583798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1583798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1583798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}