Via Michael Every at Rabobank:
It’s hard to keep up with all the escalation.
Yesterday morning Asian time the worry was that the US was about to turn its fire on Chinese surveillance-camera maker Hikvision, which would obviously have proved damaging to that PLA-linked firm. Yesterday evening the US instead shifted its attention to the UK chip-designer ARM, who has now also stepped away from “all active contracts, support entitlements, and any pending engagements” with Huawei according to the BBC. While ARM is hardly a household name, industry specialists describe the impact of it complying with the ban on Huawei and affiliates, and any Chinese entity the US sees as a similar threat, as an “insurmountable obstacle.” In other words, it is a true business killer – and Bloomberg also reports Washington believes it is closer to persuading the EU to implement a ‘de facto’ ban on Huawei too, if not a formal one, and is leaning on South Korea to join the fight. Meanwhile, other Chinese firms are also rumoured to soon be subject to a US ban: Meggvil, Meiya Pico, and Iflytek – all tech/surveillance firms like Hikvision.
