(Yicai) Oct. 19 -- China proposes to ban or impose restrictions on exports of strategically important technologies in artificial intelligence, biomedicine, and photovoltaics, while seeking to preserve many forms of international commercial activity, software access, and research collaboration.

The proposal would add 40 key technologies to the Chinese Catalog of Technologies Prohibited or Restricted From Export -- banning 14 and restricting 26 -- according to the draft revision released by the ministries of commerce and science and technology on Oct. 16. Products manufactured using the listed technologies are generally not subject to the export controls.

The revision forms part of the routine management of technology trade and is not directed at any specific country, region, or entity, the commerce ministry pointed out. The catalog will be adjusted over time to reflect technological developments, it added.

Twenty-three of the technologies are related to AI, covering large language models, AI agents, computing clusters, and information processing. They include technologies for using AI to generate and modify malicious code, AI-assisted vulnerability discovery, core LLM technologies, and AI chip design. Technologies already in the public domain through open-source releases, academic papers, or other means would be excluded.

The vast majority of AI technologies would remain freely exportable, the ministry noted. Facilitation measures, including automatic licensing, could apply to open-source tech exports, Chinese firms setting up and running their own overseas data centers, chip tape-out and fabrication conducted abroad, joint research using overseas resources, and participation in setting international standards.

LLMs can fall within the scope of export controls if the transfer of restricted technologies from China to abroad is involved, the ministry said. For example, localized LLM deployment overseas can be restricted, but when a Chinese company deploys them abroad through its own cloud infrastructure, facilitating measures can be applied.

Providing access through application programming interface calls, apps, website interactions, and software-as-a-service applications, as well as lightweight on-device deployment, would fall outside the scope of controls on LLM tech exports, according to the ministry.

In photovoltaics, the draft document adds 12 technologies covering polysilicon production, silicon wafer manufacturing, and solar cell production. Production technologies for perovskite and tandem solar modules are among those proposed for an export ban, while technologies for manufacturing polysilicon, silicon wafers, and solar cells that meet specified production capacity, size, or process thresholds would face restrictions.

Finished products made using the covered technologies would not themselves fall within the scope of the controls.

The five biomedicine technologies proposed cover cell and gene therapy, small interfering RNA drugs, and pathogenic microorganisms. Technologies for genetically modifying pathogenic microorganisms and enhancing their traits through directed serial passage, as well as proprietary process platforms for cell and gene therapies and siRNA drugs, would be prohibited from export.

For proprietary process platforms for cell and gene therapies and siRNA drugs, the ban would apply only to ownership transfers. Overseas licensing and contract research or manufacturing services that do not transfer ownership would not fall under export controls. Proprietary technologies for discovering and validating novel drug targets in these two fields would be subject to restrictions.

Public feedback on the draft is being solicited until Nov. 15.

Until the revised catalog takes effect, businesses must register the export of their technologies listed in the draft on the ministry’s online technology trade management system from Oct. 16. This includes transfers of tech ownership to overseas entities, licenses for overseas use of domestic tech, and changes in the ownership or actual control of technology to overseas entities. Transactions already under way but not yet completed must also be registered.

Editor: Futura Costaglione