US officials have eased the country’s planned chip curbs on China, according to the final draft of the new regulations issued on Tuesday. The original version of the rules had proposed a ban on US government agencies and contractors using chips from certain Chinese chipmakers such as YMTC and SMIC. However, the final version has loosened these restrictions slightly, narrowing the ban to entities it considers “critical systems” such as in the field of telecommunications. It also pushes the compliance deadline back to five years; implementation of the rules had initially been expected immediately, or within two years in some cases, Reuters reports. The curbs are part of an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which has drawn pushback from some trade groups because of the potential cost and difficulty in finding China-made chips amid vast numbers of electronic products in use, considering chips generally aren’t labeled by the manufacturer. The US has pushed to contain the Chinese semiconductor industry this year while developing its own technology in the field. US officials unveiled stringent new export controls in October, aiming to hamper China’s development in the sector. [Reuters]
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