The Trump administration has notified Huawei’s suppliers, including the American chip maker Intel, which is revoking certain sales licenses for the Chinese company and plans to reject dozens of other applications to supply the telecommunications company, people familiar with the matter told Reuters. . agency.
The lawsuit – probably the latest against Huawei Technologies under Republican President Donald Trump – is the latest in a long-running effort to weaken the world’s largest telecommunications equipment maker, which Washington sees as a threat to national security.
The notifications came amid a flurry of American efforts against China in the final days of the Trump administration. Democrat Joe Biden will take the oath of president on Wednesday.
An Intel Corp spokesman declined to comment. Commerce said it could not comment on specific licensing decisions, but said the department continues to work with other agencies to “consistently” apply licensing policies in a way that “protects US national security and foreign policy interests. “.
In an email seen by Reuters documenting the actions, the Semiconductor Industry Association said on Friday that the Commerce Department had issued “intentions to deny a significant number of export license requests to Huawei and the revocation of at least one previously issued license “. Sources familiar with the situation, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there was more than one revocation. One of the sources said eight licenses were withdrawn from four companies.
A ‘wide range’ of products
Japanese flash memory chip maker Kioxia Corp has had at least one license revoked, two sources said. The company, formerly known as Toshiba Memory Corp, said it did not “reveal details of business related to specific products or customers”.
The semiconductor association’s email said the actions covered a “wide range” of products in the semiconductor industry and asked companies if they had received notifications.
The e-mail reported that companies had been waiting “many months” for licensing decisions and, with less than a week to go, managing the denials was a challenge.
A spokesman for the semiconductor group did not respond to a request for comment.
Companies that have received “intent to deny” notifications have 20 days to respond, and the Commerce Department has 45 days to notify them of any changes to a decision or it will become final. The companies would then have another 45 days to appeal.
Intensified repression
The U.S. placed Huawei on a Commerce Department “entity list” in May 2019, restricting suppliers from selling U.S. products and technology to it.
But some sales were allowed and others were denied, while the government intensified its crackdown on the company, in part by expanding US authority to demand licenses for semiconductor sales made abroad with American technology.
Before the last action, some 150 licenses were pending for $ 120 billion in goods and technology, which were suspended because several American agencies were unable to reach an agreement on whether they should be granted, said a person familiar with the matter.
Another $ 280 billion in license orders for goods and technology for Huawei have yet to be processed, the source said, but now they are more likely to be denied.
An August rule said that products with 5G capacity would likely be rejected, but sales of less sophisticated technology would be decided on a case-by-case basis.
The last denials
The United States made the latest decisions during half a dozen meetings that started on January 4 with senior officials from the Departments of Commerce, State, Defense and Energy, the source said. Employees developed detailed guidance on what technologies were capable of 5G and then applied that standard, the person added.
That meant denying the vast majority of the nearly 150 disputed orders and revoking the eight licenses to make them consistent with the latest denials, the source said.
The U.S. action came after pressure from a recent Trump nominee in the Commerce Department, Corey Stewart, who wanted to enforce hardline policies for China after being hired for a two-month term at the agency at the end of the government.
Trump is targeting Huawei in other ways. Meng Wanzhou, Huawei’s chief financial officer, was arrested in Canada in December 2018 under a U.S. warrant. Meng, daughter of the founder of Huawei, and the company itself have been indicted for misleading banks about their business in Iran.
Meng said that she is innocent. Huawei denied the espionage charges and pleaded not guilty to the charge, which also includes charges of violating U.S. sanctions against Iran and conspiracy to steal trade secrets from American technology companies.