中国、米国製半導体へ報復措置 ハイテク戦争が新局面に

China's government has initiated a series of regulatory actions targeting American semiconductor firms, escalating the US-China tech war. Last week, Beijing launched an anti-dumping investigation into legacy chips and reportedly directed tech giants like ByteDance and Alibaba to stop buying Nvidia's newest AI chips. These moves signal a strategic pivot from a defensive stance to an offensive one, using China's market access as a powerful bargaining tool in global trade negotiations.

For years, the United States used export controls and tariffs to restrict China's access to advanced semiconductor technology. Now, Beijing is retaliating with a similar playbook, leveraging its regulatory power and market size. Analysts believe the timing is linked to negotiations over TikTok's US operations, with the chip probes serving as leverage. This new offensive demonstrates China's growing confidence in using economic tools for geopolitical goals.

The anti-dumping investigation focuses on legacy chips—those made with older technology (over 40-nanometer) that are essential for automobiles and appliances. Beijing alleges that US firms are flooding its market with unfairly cheap products. As Chinese manufacturers are already competitive in this sector, potential tariffs could make US chips from companies like Texas Instruments less attractive and boost domestic alternatives.

In the advanced AI sector, Nvidia is under direct pressure. China's market regulator is pursuing an antitrust probe against the company. More critically, Beijing has reportedly banned its top tech firms from purchasing Nvidia’s latest hardware. This move directly challenges Nvidia’s market dominance and is intended to accelerate the development of a domestic AI hardware ecosystem, forcing Chinese companies to adopt local solutions.

Coinciding with the restrictions on Nvidia, Chinese tech giant Huawei announced its own advanced AI infrastructure. Its new SuperPoD Interconnect technology can link thousands of its Ascend AI chips, creating powerful clusters for training large AI models. This system is a direct competitor to Nvidia's NVLink and represents a strategic effort to overcome the performance gap of individual domestic chips through large-scale integration.

These regulatory actions could result in steep tariffs or multi-billion-dollar fines if US-China trade negotiations falter. For global technology leaders, this signals heightened geopolitical risk and underscores the fragility of supply chains dependent on the Chinese market. Beijing's message is clear: continued access to its vast consumer and manufacturing base is now a conditional and strategic asset.