China’s ‘lifeline’ labs and rich Asians’ crypto craze

Good day, everybody! That is Cheng Ting-Fang, your #techAsia host for this week, sending greetings from Taipei as we kick off the primary working week of the lunar Yr of the Snake.

If you happen to stay in a Mandarin-speaking place like Taiwan or China, the spring pageant, which celebrates the lunar new yr, is an important vacation of the yr. Throughout this time, households historically collect for lavish feasts. Once I was a toddler, our celebration would begin within the late afternoon on New Yr’s Eve at my grandparents’ dwelling within the countryside. We loved scorching pots, marinated beef, slices of abalone, freshly steamed shrimp and fish, mullet roe and dumplings, all with infinite servings of fried turnip pancakes and candy glutinous rice desserts.

Over time, many households have regularly stopped cooking at dwelling for the spring pageant as a result of getting ready so many dishes may be overwhelming. Final yr, we tried one thing new and took a visit abroad. Nonetheless, with US President Donald Trump having simply taken workplace and the chance that I must work over the vacation, we determined to remain in Taipei this yr and dine out. As a result of we left the choice till simply two weeks earlier than New Yr’s Eve, I ended up calling round 30 eating places — together with Indian, Japanese, Thai and Italian spots (Chinese language and Taiwanese eating places had been undoubtedly full) — till I may discover a desk. In the long run, we settled for a lodge buffet, the place we had steak and lobster, together with fries and macaroons served with English breakfast tea and occasional for our New Yr’s Eve dinner. My cousins later informed me that they’d made their reservation at a conventional Taiwanese restaurant in one other metropolis as early as October to ensure a desk.

However Trump was not the one newsmaker in the course of the vacation season. DeepSeek was additionally a high subject of dialog. Even my dad and mother, who don’t work within the tech trade, have been asking what DeepSeek is all about and what it means for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Firm and Nvidia.

Firstly of the Yr of the Snake, I visited a famend temple in my hometown of Tainan in southern Taiwan. Courting again greater than 460 years, this historic website is legendary for internet hosting Taiwanese President William Lai when he was on the marketing campaign path and on many different events. The temple was packed, however I used to be in a position to participate in a particular ritual the place guests crossed a “fortune and luck” bridge, and I additionally obtained a sprinkling of “fortunate water”.

One other spotlight of the vacation was a Lunar New Yr’s Day interview with Christophe Fouquet, CEO of ASML, the highest European chip tools maker. He provided insights into AI and Japan’s efforts to rebuild its semiconductor trade. What a memorable — and busy — begin to the yr!

Labs as a lifeline

China has many artistic methods to get round US commerce restrictions. One less-reported technique is thru “pilot manufacturing strains” at state-backed laboratories throughout the nation, Cheng Ting-Fang and Lauly Li of Nikkei Asia write.

These labs and universities, which frequently have higher entry to overseas tools than US-blacklisted chipmakers, are taking part in a key position in advancing the nation’s know-how. They’re quickly establishing pilot strains and buying machines for small-scale manufacturing, enabling them to benchmark regionally made tools and confirm designs for chipmakers and start-ups.

A notable instance is Hubei Yangtze Reminiscence Labs in Wuhan, the place many engineers from main Chinese language chipmaker YMTC, which was added to the US Entity Checklist in 2022, conduct trials and take a look at samples. Related labs specializing in superior chip packaging and rising silicon photonics applied sciences are additionally sprouting up in cities like Ningbo and Wuxi.

Beijing’s initiative really goes past semiconductors, with state-backed labs inspired to launch pilot manufacturing strains in areas from superior supplies and robotics to aerospace and satellites, in keeping with a authorities doc seen by Nikkei.

Investigations and negotiations

China has revived antitrust investigations into know-how giants Google and Nvidia and can be contemplating a brand new probe in opposition to Intel as Beijing seems for leverage in talks with Trump.

China’s State Administration for Market Regulation on Tuesday introduced it had opened a contest investigation into Google, write the Monetary Instances’ Zijing Wu, Cheng Leng and Ryan McMorrow.

Two individuals accustomed to the matter stated the probe would deal with dominance of the US group’s Android working system and any hurt brought about to Chinese language phonemakers, comparable to Oppo and Xiaomi, which use the software program.

Chinese language regulators, who introduced an identical antitrust investigation into Nvidia in December, had been now additionally launching a proper probe into Intel, stated two individuals accustomed to the scenario. Nonetheless, the character of the probe into the US chipmaker remained unclear, one of many individuals stated, including whether or not it was formally launched might be affected by the state of US-China relations.

Beijing’s transfer to construct instances in opposition to outstanding US tech firms comes as they’re more and more caught within the crossfire of rising tensions between the 2 world powers.

The Google probe, which regulators first started in 2019, had been shelved for years, however was reopened in December, stated two individuals accustomed to the matter. That transfer got here simply earlier than Trump, who had campaigned on guarantees of imposing steep tariffs in opposition to Chinese language items, was sworn in as US president.

Vacation spot: Mars?

Over the previous few years, key tech suppliers to Apple, HP and Nvidia have shifted manufacturing from China to Thailand, India, Vietnam, Mexico and Taiwan, consistent with US stress to diversify away from Asia’s largest economic system. Nonetheless, this “friend-shoring” technique is now below menace from Trump’s unpredictable tariff insurance policies.

In response to an evaluation by Nikkei Asia’s Lauly Li and Cheng Ting-Fang, commerce deficits with these economies have considerably widened over the previous few years resulting from provide chain shifts, whilst America’s commerce imbalance with China has improved. As a result of Trump typically criticises commerce deficits and vows to right them, investments on pleasant shores could now not be as safe as they as soon as appeared, creating uncertainty and probably greater prices all through the availability chain.

Chairman TH Tung of Pegatron, a key provider to each Apple and Tesla, even joked that the one technique to be really secure from new tariffs can be to maneuver to Mars.

Loopy wealthy crypto buyers

Wealthy Asian buyers, significantly in Singapore and elsewhere in south-east Asia, are turning their eyes to cryptocurrency investments, pushed by Trump’s re-election and the rise in bitcoin’s worth, Nikkei Asia’s Dylan Loh writes. In response to a survey by Aspen Digital, extra rich people — as much as 76 per cent of respondents — had invested in digital belongings in Asia for 2024 in contrast with an identical ballot in 2022.

This surge has led to rising competitors amongst cryptocurrency platforms and conventional monetary establishments vying for deep-pocketed, high-asset shoppers. Whereas the potential for vital returns is attracting substantial funding, dangers stay, together with cryptocurrency’s excessive volatility, geopolitical uncertainties below Trump and a altering regulatory setting in Singapore, the place mass-marketing to retail shoppers is strongly discouraged.