By Stephen Nellis
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – A wider bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers is raising concerns about China’s increasing utilization of RISC-V chip design technology. This comes after Reuters reported on the growing worries about this technology in both houses of Congress.
RISC-V, pronounced “risk five,” is a cost-free open-source technology that competes with pricey proprietary technology from Arm Holdings and Intel Corp, two major players in the semiconductor and software design industry. RISC-V can be incorporated into various applications, ranging from smartphone chips to advanced processors for artificial intelligence.
While U.S. firms like Qualcomm and Alphabet’s Google have embraced RISC-V, Chinese companies have also shown significant interest in it.
In a Reuters report last month, at least four influential U.S. lawmakers expressed concerns about Chinese utilization of this technology, as RISC-V is not subjected to the comprehensive export controls imposed by the U.S. when it comes to sending chip technology to China.
Now, a larger group of 18 lawmakers, including five Democrats, are seeking answers from the Biden administration regarding its strategies to prevent China from gaining dominance in RISC-V and utilizing this dominance to the detriment of U.S. national security and economic interests. A letter sent to Raimondo by the group states this.
The lawmakers consist of the Republican chairman and ranking Democrat from a select committee on China in the House of Representatives, as well as Democratic representatives from New Jersey, Florida, Michigan, and Indiana. Additionally, they also inquired about the Biden administration’s potential use of an existing executive order that would require U.S. companies to obtain an export license before engaging with Chinese companies on RISC-V technology.
“Although open-source collaboration on RISC-V holds significant promise for advancing the U.S. semiconductor industry, its benefits can only be fully realized when contributors focus solely on improving the technology, rather than aiding China’s technological goals and geopolitical interests,” stated the group of lawmakers in their letter.
A spokesperson from the Commerce Department mentioned that Raimondo had received the letter and would respond through appropriate channels.
(Reporting by Stephen Nellis in San Francisco; Editing by Jamie Freed)
