Why US chip controls took a back seat at the Xi-Trump summit
There is little question that Jensen Huang and Lisa Su, the heads of US semiconductor chip giants Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), had secured two of the best seats in the house at the White House state dinner on Thursday evening: at the head table alongside the two presidents and their wives. But what remains unclear is how much progress they were able to make on their primary goal of…
At the Xi-Trump summit, chip industry leaders Jensen Huang and Lisa Su were seated at the head table along with the two presidents and their spouses. However, the progress towards reopening China's market to US chip exports, a key goal, remains uncertain due to US semiconductor chip export controls. Despite these controls still being in place, they did not appear to be a significant topic during the Chinese President's state visit to Washington.
Kyle Chan, a Brookings Institute fellow specializing in Chinese technology, noted that export controls were not a major point of discussion during the summit, unlike during talks with President Biden. US Trade Representative Jamie Greer confirmed that the US had removed "national security issues" export controls from the table during negotiations.
China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not reference export controls in its announcement of the summit's deliverables. The Trump administration has largely maintained the restrictions introduced by the Biden administration in 2022, which limited China's ability to obtain advanced chips and chipmaking equipment. Some areas, like a ban on Nvidia's H20 chip, were even tightened under the Trump administration.
Beijing appears to be growing more confident in its chip self-reliance efforts, with Chinese chip manufacturers capturing an increasing share of the domestic market. Despite this, China may push back against any new US restrictions, as they view them as a violation of the 2025 Busan Agreement.
Written by urgent.news from South China Morning Post's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
