Beijing will welcome the American semiconductor manufacturer expanding its presence in the Chinese market, signaling a further warming in ties between the world’s two largest economies, the Chinese minister of commerce informed the president of Micron Technology Inc. (MU.O).
According to a brief statement posted on the website of the commerce ministry on Friday, in a meeting on November 1, Wang Wentao, the minister of commerce, promised Sanjay Mehrotra, the president, and CEO of Micron Technology, that China would improve the environment for foreign investment and offer service guarantees for foreign businesses.
“We welcome Micron Technology to continue to take root in the Chinese market and achieve better development under the premise of complying with Chinese laws and regulations,” Wang added.
The rapprochement transpires in the aftermath of Micron’s failure to pass a network security evaluation, as reported by China’s cyberspace authority, which also prohibited Chinese operators of critical infrastructure from purchasing memory chips from the U.S. manufacturer.
Many saw China’s action against Micron as payback for Washington’s attempts to deny Beijing access to important technologies. It happened only one day after the wealthy countries of the Group of Seven (G7) decided to “de-risk, not decouple” from China, and as Washington put pressure on its allies to follow suit in limiting the shipment of semiconductor equipment to China.
Wang and Mehrotra’s meeting on Wednesday coincides with a recent defusing of tensions between Beijing and Washington as representatives from both nations try to set up a meeting between US President Joe Biden and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco later this month.
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