U.S. President-elect Joe Biden comments on the certificate of electoral college on December 14, 2020 at the Queen Theater in Wilmington, Delaware.
Roberto Schmidt | AFP | Getty Images
GUANGZHOU, China – President-elect Joe Biden is unlikely to overturn President Donald Trump’s challenge to China’s technology industry and companies – but Biden will be more targeted in his approach and collaborate with allies, experts told CNBC.
During his presidency, Trump challenged China’s technology industry through sanctions, executive orders and other actions. Biden probably. Such a policy will continue.
“The bullet has gone out of the chamber. Trump has completely disrupted the decades-old standoff between Europe and China,” Abishur Prakash, a geopolitical expert at the Toronto-based consulting firm Innovating the Future (CIF), told CNBC.
Collaborate with colleagues
Biden will be able to continue his approach of cutting off Chinese technology companies.
“I think so Admins will still see opportunity as a key source of competition and will continue to pursue some of Trump’s critical tech flow to China, “said Adam Segal, director of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) ‘s digital and cyberspace policy.
In an email to CNBC, he said the difference is that the process will become more collaborative with both the private sector and allies, and more focused on a narrow set of technologies.
Biden’s team selection will likely be less technological, but will have to build high walls around people who are deemed necessary to protect for national security reasons.
Paul Triolo, head of geotechnical practices at Eurasia Group, a risk adviser, agreed that the Biden administration would work with colleagues on its strategy toward Chinese technology.
Triolo told CNBC that Biden’s team “will clarify what controls should be placed in the field of emerging and basic technology.” Some of these areas will include artificial intelligence and so-called quantum computing, the next generation of computing that uses quantum physics to solve problems that take years of existing computers.
“Here, Biden’s team selection will be less likely to control low-tech, but will build high walls around what is considered necessary to protect for national security reasons,” Triolo said in an email. I would expect a definition of what technologies are crucial to control for national security reasons under administration. “
Prakash says Biden is likely to push for Trump’s exclusion of Chinese vendors from the world’s next pay generation 5G mobile network. The Trump administration is pushing allies to cut Huawei from its network. Australia, Japan and the UK have done it effectively.
The geopolitical expert said Biden could also “recover” in areas such as blacklisting Chinese companies or certain export controls, while also innovating in terms of its approach in other areas, such as merger and acquisition data rules.
One thing is for sure – the tech fight between the US and China will continue under Biden’s presidency.
“The US does not have many options. Either it allows China to dominate the world through tech or it challenges it,” Prakash said.
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