Brief
China’s chip sector narrows U.S. gap as export controls backfire, says professor
U.S. restrictions on advanced chips have not halted China’s progress, according to a University of Illinois professor.
By Felo News Desk · Published
Professor Rakesh Kumar, an electrical and computer engineering professor at the University of Illinois Urbana‑Champaign, argues that U.S. export controls on advanced chips have failed to curb China’s semiconductor advances. Kumar, who warned in 2022 that the Biden administration’s sweeping export restrictions would not work, says Chinese processors and AI models are now closing the performance gap with U.S. rivals.
What happened
In October 2022 the United States unveiled broad export controls on advanced chips and chip‑making equipment, expanding them in subsequent years. Four years later, Kumar notes that Chinese processors are “very, very close” to U.S. models, and AI applications such as robotics and smart cameras are running on domestically produced silicon.
What the reports add
Kumar tells Fortune that most AI workloads do not require the most advanced chips, so cutting China off from U.S. technology pushed Beijing to invest heavily in its own ecosystem. He cites Huawei’s recent launch of premium smartphones and AI processors, and a statement from the company on Oct. 13 that it has shipped more than 100 million devices powered by its Kirin chips since 2023.
Chinese AI lab DeepSeek and startup Z.ai have adapted flagship models to run on Huawei’s Ascend processors, while food‑delivery giant Meituan said in June it trained a 1.6‑trillion‑parameter AI model entirely on domestic chips.
IDC data, referenced by Reuters, shows Nvidia’s share of data‑center chips in China fell to 34 % in the first half of 2026, and shipments of its AI accelerators dropped 44 % from a year earlier. At a Shanghai industry conference, ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) announced it will debut a new memory‑chip architecture by year‑end, a design it claims could outpace Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron.
What was said
“I’m not going to say ‘I told you so,’ but it really is ‘I told you so,’” Kumar said to Fortune. He added, “Export controls spurred China to invest all this money to set up an ecosystem where they can now serve these applications by themselves.”
How it came about
Kumar’s criticism dates back to a 2022 Fortune column where he warned that “you can’t win an important race by hoping to trip your opponent.” The U.S. goal of halting China’s chip progress has shifted, according to the professor, as Chinese firms accelerate development across processors, AI models and memory technologies.
Key facts
- U.S. export controls on advanced chips were introduced in October 2022 and expanded thereafter. (fortune.com)
- Huawei reported shipping over 100 million devices powered by its Kirin processors since 2023. (fortune.com)
- Nvidia’s share of data‑center chips in China fell to 34 % in H1 2026, with AI‑accelerator shipments down 44 % year‑on‑year. (fortune.com)
- CXMT announced a new memory‑chip architecture to debut by the end of 2026. (fortune.com)
- Meituan trained a 1.6‑trillion‑parameter AI model using only domestically made chips. (fortune.com)
Sources
- [1] fortune.com — originally reported as “'I told you so': China's chip sector is making breakthroughs—and U.S. export controls are the reasons why”
