Commerce blacklists five Chinese tech groups

The Commerce Department added five Chinese technology groups to its “entity” list on Friday, effectively blacklisting the organizations from buying components from U.S. companies unless they get a waiver.

The five entities added were high-performance computing group Sugon, the Wuxi Jiangnan Institute of Computing Technology, semiconductor company Higon, Chengdu Haiguang Integrated Circuit and Chengdu Haiguang Microelectronics Technology.

The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) wrote in its notice of the additions to the list that “these five entities have been determined by the U.S. Government to be acting contrary to the national security or foreign policy interests of the United States.”

BIS noted that Sugon and the Wuxi Jiangnan Institute of Computing Technology are leaders of China’s development of high-performance computing, with both also involved in modernizing China’s military.