When China’s Communist party delegates meet on Monday to thrash out their economic plan for the next five years, the semiconductor industry will be high on the agenda.
Beijing’s 30-year push to build a homegrown chip sector has taken on a new sense of urgency as Donald Trump’s administration tightens its chokehold on China’s leading technology groups.
Washington has barred companies worldwide from manufacturing chips for Huawei, the telecoms business, in what is a potential death sentence for its affiliate HiSilicon, China’s largest chip designer. The US has also restricted American companies from supplying Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, China’s most advanced chipmaker, with the machines needed for making chips.