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In the last days of his presidency, Donald Trump pulled against another Chinese technology giant. On Wednesday, the Trump administration officially added Xiaomi, along with eight other companies, to its list of “Communist Chinese military companies.”
Enterprises designated by the Department of Defense as communist Chinese military companies are blacklisted to receive investments from U.S. citizens or organizations. If not overturned, the name would mean that existing investors in the US will have to give up Xiaomi.
Xiaomi is one of the largest phone manufacturers in the world, with only Samsung and Huawei selling a larger amount of phones, according to IDC research. With a global market share of 13.1%, thanks to its popularity in China, Latin America and Europe, Xiaomi sells even more phones than Apple. (Apple sells fewer phones than competitors, but earns much more per phone sold.)
Xiaomi did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Redmi Note 9T, one of Xiaomi’s latest budget phones.
Xiaomi
Xiaomi’s name differs from the one gave the Trump administration to Huawei, China’s largest technology company. Huawei is on the U.S. Department of Commerce’s “Entity List,” which bans U.S. businesses from trading with it. That’s why recent Huawei phones work without access to Google’s Play Store or US chipmakers.
Huawei has been placed on the Entity List along with ZTE, because a large part of its business is telecommunications equipment, such as setting up 4G and 5G networks. This part of Huawei’s operations – not the manufacture of telephones, for which it is better known in the West – has been identified by the Trump administration as a national security risk. Xiaomi only sells consumer electronics, which is probably why it was blacklisted.
In 1999, the Department of Defense compiled the list of companies affiliated with or controlled by the People’s Liberation Army.
“The key to the development of the PRK’s military, intelligence and other security equipment is the country’s large, seemingly private economy,” Trump said in a recent executive order. “Through the national strategy of military-civilian merger, the VRC is increasing the size of the country’s military-industrial complex by forcing Chinese civilian companies to support its military and intelligence activities.”
Trump’s reproach on Chinese companies was a feature of his presidency. Besides Huawei and ZTE, Trump also has attempted to ban social media platform TikTok. Last week, he signed an executive order It bans transactions with eight Chinese-made apps, including WeChat Pay and AliPay.