In January, just before the new government moved to the White House, the American blacklisted manufacturer Xiaomi. The company is on the rise and is now the third largest smartphone maker in the world, taking advantage of Huawei’s downfall. American investors are now banned from investing in the company and those who already have an investment in Xiaomi are expected to dispose of these holdings by November 11. Xiaomi shares are traded through Over The Counter Pink Sheets in the form of American Depository Receipts (ADR). They closed Friday at $ 15.34 a share, down 25% since the blacklist was announced.
The award given to Xiaomi founder Lei Jun made the U.S. Department of Defense blacklist the company
Xiaomi was blacklisted by the United States Department of Defense along with eight other Chinese companies because of alleged ties to the Chinese military. After posting our blacklisted article in January, we received a statement from Xiaomi that said: “The Company is in compliance with the law and operating in compliance with the relevant laws and regulations of the jurisdictions in which it conducts its business. The Company reiterates that it provides products and services for civil and commercial use.The Company confirms that it is not owned, controlled or affiliated with the Chinese armed forces and is not a “Chinese Communist Military Company” defined in the NDAA. interests of the Company and our stakeholders. “
An award presented to Xiaomi founder and CEO Lei Jun led the US to blacklist Xiaomi earlier this year
Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal cited a lawsuit filed with the U.S. Department of Defense for publishing a report that it claimed to reveal the real reason for Xiaomi’s blacklist. That report said that an award given to Xiaomi’s founder and CEO, Lei Jun, for his services to the state was the reason why, in his last days, the Trump administration decided to call Xiaomi. Lei was one of 100 executives in China who received the “Notable Builder of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” award in 2019. Xiaomi promotes the award that is listed on the executive’s biography page on the corporate website and in Xiaomi’s annual report.
The lawsuit also mentioned Xiaomi’s investment in advanced technologies, including 5G and artificial intelligence. Xiaomi is trying to use the courts to remove the blacklist and filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court in Washington, DC The United States Department of Defense responded with its own deposit that includes the report on the sentence granted to Lei Jun Other prominent names on the Department of Defense list include smartphone maker Huawei, whose problems with U.S. restrictions were discussed today in an earlier story, and China’s main smelter, SMIC.
Lei’s award was given to him by China’s MIIT; this is the government agency that oversees the country’s policies related to technology and industrial policy. The United States Department of Defense claims that this agency manages China’s “civil-military merger”. Under this program, China works with private companies to create technology for the military.
Over the years, there has been talk about Xiaomi selling its handsets in the United States. At the moment, it offers limited products in the states, including energy banks, and its popular fitness tracker Mi Band can be purchased in the United States through Amazon. Former Xiaomi vice president Hugo Barra said in 2016 that the company would end up selling its handsets in the United States, although a lot of time has passed since then. In addition, the US government has become much cooler in its relationships with Chinese technology companies, and outside of OnePlus, these phone manufacturers have not been very successful in the US lately.
