The Trump administration on Aug. 17 announced it will further tighten restrictions on Huawei, aimed at cutting off its access to chips made with U.S. technology.
The administration also added 38 Huawei affiliates in 21 countries to its trade blacklist, barring U.S. firms from doing business with them. Adding the new set of firms raises the total number of blocked Huawei affiliates to 152. Huawei and its affiliates were first added to the blacklist in May 2019 on national security grounds.
Huawei didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The move comes as the administration takes tougher action against Beijing on multiple fronts, including tech companies posing security threats. Washington has long said Huawei equipment could be exploited by the Chinese regime for espionage or to disrupt communication networks. U.S. officials point to laws in China that compel companies to cooperate with intelligence agencies when asked. The company has denied these allegations.
The administration has worked to persuade allies to exclude Huawei from their 5G rollouts, an endeavor that appears to be yielding fruit as a growing number of countries choose alternative telecom suppliers.
Pompeo recently called on companies and countries to stop using Chinese software and hardware that pose risks to user data under the state department’s “clean network” initiative.
The administration this month took aim at Chinese social media apps TikTok and WeChat, banning transactions with their Chinese parent companies ByteDance and Tencent, respectively, starting in September. Officials said the ban is an effort to protect American users’ data from espionage by Beijing.
The commerce department also announced on Aug. 17 a separate new rule that requires firms to obtain a license when a company on the trade blacklist such as Huawei acts “as a purchaser, intermediate consignee, ultimate consignee, or end user” in a transaction.
Existing U.S. restrictions have already hurt Huawei and its suppliers.
On Aug. 8, Chinese financial magazine Caixin reported that Huawei will stop making its flagship Kirin chipsets next month due to U.S. pressure on suppliers.
Huawei’s HiSilicon division has relied on software from U.S. companies such as Cadence Design Systems and Synopsys to design its chips, and outsourced the production to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), which uses equipment from U.S. companies.
TSMC has said it will not ship wafers to Huawei after Sept. 15.
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