China has proposed expanding its technology export-control catalogue to cover advanced artificial intelligence, biomedicine and solar technologies, but the draft is not yet final. Reuters reports that the revision spans 40 technologies across the three sectors. Public comments are open through November 15, while interim pre-export registration is already being implemented for the technologies under consideration.
The AI portion is narrower than that 40-item total. Bloomberg reports that the draft names 23 AI technologies, including large language models, AI agents, chip designs and computing clusters. For products exceeding specified performance thresholds, restricted technology could include model weights and source code.
What the proposal would and would not cover
The controls would apply to overseas localization and deployment of restricted AI technologies, according to Nikkei Asia. Deployments on company-owned cloud infrastructure overseas might qualify for an exception when the risks are considered manageable.
The draft also draws limits around how broadly the rules would reach. Technologies already released into the public domain as open source would be exempt. Overseas access delivered through APIs, apps, websites, software-as-a-service products or lightweight on-device deployments would fall outside the proposed large-model export controls, Nikkei reports.
The rationale and what happens next
China’s Commerce Ministry described the revision as routine technology-trade management rather than a measure aimed at a particular country, region or company. The ministry said the expanding use of AI and the other covered technologies in sensitive fields created risks of capabilities spreading inappropriately, while maintaining that normal international exchanges should continue.
The proposal arrives amid wider technology restrictions between China and other major economies. Europe, Japan and the United States have imposed controls affecting advanced semiconductors and manufacturing equipment, while China has imposed export controls on critical-mineral supply chains. The exact shape of the new rules can still change during the comment period, and the inspected reports do not specify the performance thresholds that would trigger controls on model weights or source code.
