With six days remaining in office, the Trump administration decided to put yet another Chinese electronics giant in its sights: Xiaomi, the world’s third largest phone maker. The U.S. Department of Defense is now designating Xiaomi as a “Chinese Communist military company”, meaning that it is now vulnerable to Trump’s executive order that prohibits the United States from investing in such companies – and may force American companies and others American investors to divest Xiaomi on November 11, 2021, as reported by Reuters.
Although a Biden government may cancel the order before that, it is interesting to see an electronics company like Xiaomi on the list. Most of the other companies on the list are industrially oriented, specializing in aviation, aerospace, shipbuilding, chemistry, telecommunications, construction and other forms of infrastructure. Huawei, the world’s second largest phone maker, is also on the list, but Huawei also manufactures telecommunications equipment on a large scale; US lawmakers have been specifically concerned with Huawei being part of the country’s cellular infrastructure (see also: ZTE).
By the way, this list is not the same as the US Department of Commerce’s “entity list,” which normally prevents American companies from exporting technology to blacklisted companies, such as dronemaker DJI. But some Chinese companies like Huawei (and Chinese chip maker SMIC) are on both lists now.
Speaking of the Department of Commerce, it is moving forward to try to prevent six entire countries, now designated as “foreign adversaries”, from providing communications equipment to the United States, including China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba and the government of Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela.
Xiaomi did not immediately respond to a request for comment.