China has pledged to invest $1.9 billion in Yangtze Memory Technologies, the country’s largest maker of memory chips. This is reported by the Bloomberg news agency based on data from a Chinese government website.
The investment size suggests that Beijing supports the country’s beleaguered chip sector. Chinese chip companies are hit by the US trade sanctions and are struggling with a worldwide decline in chip demand.
It was previously reported that China is preparing a major support package for the expansion of its own chip industry as the Americans try to slow down the country’s technological and military progress. The administration of US President Biden also recently presented new rules for exports to China.
Under the new rules, American chip companies can no longer supply certain equipment to peers wholly owned by China and on the so-called blacklist. The Americans also want to prevent foreign companies from selling advanced chips to China.
Chinese chip maker Yangtze Memory Technologies was added to the ever-growing blacklist in December last year. Once added to that list, American companies must apply for a special license to supply even fairly simple technical products to the company in question.
