
TSMC halts new Huawei orders after US tightens restrictions - therealchiggs
https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Huawei-crackdown/TSMC-halts-new-Huawei-orders-after-US-tightens-restrictions
======
fermienrico
To preface, firstly - I am a supporter of free global trade and greater
collaboration between countries to maximize the benefit of each other.

The problem starts when there is a massive asymmetry in the trade. China has
completely blocked US services from Google to Uber, and gladly accepts
manufacturing investment - Tesla Shanghai factory, Intel's Chengdu factory,
etc. because the CCP knows that they will gain tremendously by having IP
physically based in China. It leaks like a sieve. I've seen it first hand (in
semiconductor industry).

America should protect its own interests and interests of other democratic
nations before they get eroded, dismantled and sold off to CCP's interests. If
China doesn't want American software services running and fairly competing
because of CCP surveillance requirements, well...then the US should block all
Chinese services from exploiting users[1] and their data, may be EU should
block Chinese services from running there until there is strict GDPR
requirements and the data is located in EU datacenters. There should be
independent datacenter security audits just like CCP wants keys to iCloud
datacenters. That would just get us to the fairness level and that's still not
enough - there should be a reverse asymmetry to make up for last 20 years of
damage - incentivize US/EU services and manfuacturing while simultaneously
imposing sanctions and import duties on goods/services made in China. Why not?
Can someone tell me why the US/EU shouldn't do the same? I should not be able
to buy $1.99 USB cable including shipping from China.

[1] [https://citizenlab.ca/2020/05/we-chat-they-
watch/](https://citizenlab.ca/2020/05/we-chat-they-watch/)

~~~
FooBarWidget
Wait a minute... You're pretending like trade is only "fair" if selling
happens in both directions. Doesn't that fly directly in the face of what
trade means?

You buy something, but you get value in return. That's why it's not called
"donation". If the thing you bought is not valuable to you then why did you
buy it in the first place?

Also, there is all this talk about "forced" tech transfers, but nobody forced
US companies at gunpoint. US companies always had the choice to not enter the
China market. They signed tech tranfer contracts, willingly, because they
think the upsides (gaining a new market) are higher than the downsides, or
that the downsides are manageable. The fact is, companies made a choice. And
now the US government is making that choice for them?

From a national supply chain security or technology hegemony point of view it
makes sense to deny certain transfers, but let's recognize that this is just
geopolitics and not about ethics, fairness, etc. The rherotic about fairness
just doesn't make sense upon further scrutiny. If the US government doesn't
fully believe in free market, why not just go ahead and say so instead of all
the mental gymnastics?

~~~
ngcc_hk
You cannot sell certain service to china. That is not fair.

~~~
the_mitsuhiko
That’s true for all countries though in some capacity.

~~~
koheripbal
Right - and it's unfair to the degree that it is true. For China it is
MASSIVELY unfair - far far more than any other industrialized economy.

------
salimmadjd
Anyone else feels this is shortsighted?

Estimates are that China is 10 years away to be able to build chips
domestically that can compete with TSMC. Mostly because a lot of the precision
chip making technologies are hard to make and are only made by a few
manufactures and their exports are controlled.

However, I feel like our new competitive mindset is using the wall to block
others. To wall off China to wall off immigrants.

I love to see manufacturing sector return to US and protect US jobs, however,
it seems like instead of investing into the future, like we had in the 50s,
60s, 70s we are spending our limited resources waging all types of wars and
then using our might to block other countries now.

We've lost our ability to make political decisions and planning with a long-
term vision, and if we think building walls will stop innovation in other
places, we're wrong.

All we're doing is setting back China for a few years, fueling a nationalistic
fervor to motivate their public even more and once they've caught up, they'll
even be stronger and more competitive.

While we might keep the aging Western Europe under our pressure, rest of the
emerging world will be under China.

I'm also really curious how this action will ultimately impact Taiwanese views
of merging with China. It's possible this might create more sympathy and
create a massive defeat for the nationalist side of Taiwan and the country
might vote to merge with China.

What would we do then? Stop Apple from buying chips from TSMC?

~~~
NonEUCitizen
Just a note on the word "nationalist" re: Taiwan. It's confusing to most, but
in Taiwan, "nationalist" is the _pro_ -China faction, due to historical
association of that term with the KMT.

"Green," pro-independence, or "TI" (Taiwan Independence) would be the less
confusing term for the side you think might lose with this development.

The TI side has been winning bigly in the past year thanks to Xi Jinping and
Carrie Lam's treatment of Hong Kong, and to China's and WHO's lack of
transparency in the early days of COVID-19.

~~~
GenericsMotors
>Just a note on the word "nationalist" re: Taiwan. It's confusing to most, but
in Taiwan, "nationalist" is the pro-China faction, due to historical
association of that term with the KMT.

>"Green," pro-independence, or "TI" (Taiwan Independence) would be the less
confusing term for the side you think might lose with this development.

TIL, thanks for sharing!

------
billfruit
"All non-U. S. chip manufacturers using American chipmaking equipment,
intellectual property or design software will have to apply for a license
before shipping chips to Huawei."

Isn't that really crossing the line; It implies that if a country buys
American Equipment/Software then they are at the whims of American policy;
American equipment comes with strings attached: Really does not look appealing
to many countries this.

What if Huawei rebrand themselves or try to gain a new identity etc, then US
regulations has to catch up again.

Moreover is this some sort of punitive measure against Huawei? What if they
approach US courts, what shall be the outcome?

~~~
dannyw
I mean, if you do business in China and recognise Taiwan, you will be shown
the door and/or your. business will be literally stolen, so... it's not really
different.

It's about time we start making China accountable. It's about time we start
blocking Tencent and Alibaba from further American acquisition or investment.
It's about time we restrict and throttle CCP-controlled media platforms like
Tiktok; the same way China does for Western-owned media platforms.

We can't keep getting punched and just stand still.

~~~
boudin
This approach will only have impact in short term. You can be sure that TSMC
is working behind the scene to create a legal entity to work around this
legislation and get one of its main customers back. There's just 2 potential
outcomes: \- TSMC having found a way to workaround that restrictions and
gaining back Huwaeï \- China being forced to quickly gain the same level of
expertise

In both situation the outcome is even less control for the US.

~~~
peteradio
Total commoditization of the chip making process spread across borders. That
greatly reduces the drive for China to invest in the technology, thus removing
a handle on the global economy.

~~~
fomine3
Global Foundries exits 7nm- battle.

------
cesarb
Suppose the actors were different: wouldn't this be like, for instance,
Germany forbidding a Brazilian company from exporting a widget it manufactured
to the USA, just because the Brazilian company had used a German-made lathe in
its Brazilian factory to make the widget?

~~~
Traster
I don't think you can talk about this in terms of just rules. What is
happening here is one world superpower is using all the leverage it can to
attack another world power. Germany isn't going to do this firstly because it
doesn't have the leverage and secondly because they're not interested in
playing that sort of raw power politics. This is how cold wars are conducted,
the belligerents pour resources into strategically important partners. In this
case the US is applying pressure on TSMC to damage Chinese technology
companies, which they need to do because their local strategic
manufacturer(Intel) is falling behind. You're going to continue to see the US
find reasons to pour money into partnerships with everyone on China's front
door. Meanwhile China will pour resources into partnerships with Europe,
Russia and Australia to try and pry US partners away.

There's no "Fair" in this situation, there's only "Winning" by forcing China
into compliance with US demands.

~~~
Udik
> forcing China into compliance with US demands.

Except that, as it's clear from the rest of your comment (with which I agree
fully) there are no real demands from the US to China except a demand for
subalternity. In other words, the only reason behind this moralising and
chest-beating is simply that the US wants to keep its power by obstructing a
competitor.

------
_ph_
This is a disaster and can get ugly very quickly. Whatever the concerns of the
USA against Huawei are, trying to destroy the company by pressuring
international companies in severing all ties is an extremely hostile movement.

Next step, as China has already hinted towards, is actions in China against
Apple. And we don't know how further the escalation will go. So far, any
ambition of China towards Taiwan has been limited by the fact that China
depends quite on Taiwanese fabs. Remove that, and accidents might happen...
which would harm the whole world.

~~~
someperson
This won't kill Huawei at all, and instead of manufacturing chips with TSMC,
won't they'll just switch their HiSilicon Kirin chip manufacturing to SMICs'
14nm process? I know it's no longer useful to compare process node sizes
between companies anymore, but for what it's worth Intel is still stuck on
14nm and they're still considered by many a competitive chip-making titan.

Also remember when United States pulled a similar stunt on ZTE a few years ago
(banning us of American parts), only to reach an agreement and walk back the
decision?

~~~
londons_explore
> his won't kill Huawei at all

The goal isn't to kill Huawei... it's to make sure that Huawei 5G tech is
delayed by 1 or 2 years. Banning their already-designed chips from shipping is
a good way to delay them by a year or two.

Most of the USA doesn't even have 5G deployed yet, and the US is hoping local
manufacturers will get the local market as well as lots of the world market.

~~~
magicsmoke
US 5G manufacturers are already screwed due to US spectrum allocation,
according to this DoD report.

[https://media.defense.gov/2019/Apr/03/2002109302/-1/-1/0/DIB...](https://media.defense.gov/2019/Apr/03/2002109302/-1/-1/0/DIB_5G_STUDY_04.03.19.PDF)

TLDR: US spectrum allocation forces US 5G suppliers to design products
primarily for the mmWave portion of the spectrum, which suffers from more
technical problems such than the sub-6 GHz spectrum that Chinese products are
using. The reason why the US didn't allocate more sub-6 GHz spectrum is
because those frequencies are used by the US military.

~~~
jessaustin
It seems kind of silly that USA military would use tech that needs a pristine
frequency band in the first place. During a war, are their opponents going to
be super-polite about interference? Or, are they going to look at FCC regs
when deciding which frequencies to jam?

~~~
effie
Of course I have no idea about the real capabilities of that 6GHz equipment to
use different bands in case of interference, that is most probably classified
info. But economically, it would be silly to have all military equipment in
continental U.S. work nominally on many different frequency bands. Likelihood
of effective jamming of 6GHz bands in the U.S. is quite small (island with
large area far away from enemies, low effective range of 6GHz radiation). Some
systems have to be resilient against radio interference, such as attack
warning systems or government - military com systems, but there is lot more in
military - support systems, test systems, research systems, training systems
and god knows what else.

------
jacquesm
And thus enables the Chinese semiconductor industry.

~~~
dannyw
The Chinese semiconductor industry is going to happen no matter what; it is
one of their strategic priorities and they have been moving in this direction
for a long time.

This is about making it harder and inflicting some pain on them.

~~~
jacquesm
The effect will be the exact opposite, it will make it harder and will inflict
some pain on them _in the short term_ , but in the longer term any internal
resistance has just evaporated and they will double down on this.

~~~
addicted
More importantly this will also encourage non Chinese nations to assist in any
move away from US power over the semiconductor industry.

India has already started taking steps. It’s likely the Europeans will as well
now.

The US government is taking these actions with blinders on. They only seem
capable of modeling effects 6 months into the future and only the direct
impacts on China (and barely even that, considering how poorly their entire
tariff wars have gone, with the US basically having got nothing so far). The
reality is that there is an entire planet’s worth of other countries also
watching the US lashing out. Especially American allies who have been directly
attacked by the US government over the past couple of years, that are now
convinced they need to start steadily moving away from US influence.

~~~
kyboren
If "Europe" stops sitting around with its dick in its hand and actually
subsidizes/incentivizes development of a globally-competitive domestic
semiconductor industry, I will be shocked. India, too, is hopelessly reliant
on the US semiconductor technology ecosystem.

What is increasingly clear is that both the US and China see domestic leading-
edge semiconductor production capacity as a core national security interest.
It is not so easy to assist China's project; serious moves to help China
establish independence in semiconductors will cause cascading changes in the
relationship with the US. While they may be disquieted by recent US behavior,
western European leaders can see perfectly well that China is not a viable
strategic partner and that the risks and costs of being kicked out of the US
security and trade umbrella (this stupid trade war with the EU is peanuts to
the kind of coercive tariffs and sanctions looming in such a case) outweigh
the benefits of helping China make better semiconductors.

------
ekianjo
Technically it should not be an issue since Taiwan does not exist on paper and
therefore China's CCP should have no problem asserting full control over TSMC
operations. At least if we believe the CCP's version of the world.

~~~
tinza123
Taiwan is a region and a very important one, no one was denying that, even the
Chinese government. The dispute was on what a country means and it has
complicated historical reasons on both sides. Same thing goes for why Guam and
California are not the same political entities among the US, or why Spain
doesn't recognize Catalonia.

Don't be ignorant and try to judge on things you don't fully understand.

~~~
oblio
> Don't be ignorant and try to judge on things you don't fully understand.

The first bit was ok, but this is uncalled for.

------
wbraun
What are the near term implications of this? I was under the impression that
this was always considered a pretty extreme option. Between this and the plans
for the TSMC fab in the USA I wonder what suddenly shifted in US - Taiwan
relations.

Does this mean that Huawei loses the 5G competition because they are not going
to be able to get the chips they need fabricated?

Is China going to try to split up Huawei into a bunch of "totally not Huawei"
companies?

~~~
teruakohatu
I am sure 5G chips can be built with older processes. They might just need
more cooling and be less efficient.

~~~
kyboren
That makes Huawei's 5G chips much less commercially competitive, giving
Qualcomm a leg up in the handset market and making it much harder for Huawei
to win.

However, for base stations, which are the real prize, Huawei already has a ~1y
stockpile of Xilinx FPGAs, so any effects on Huawei's 5G market position will
take some time to manifest.

------
strooper
China has already bought the second (Russia) and third world (not in terms of
wealth, rather actual third world) with the cheap variants of original
technologies. Intellectual property is meaningless in this arena, and so is
reasoning. Moreover, America has stopped streaming the "American dream",
stopped winning "friends and allies", and is flexing muscles on the rest of
the world.

I thought this war of the giants will remain paused for the rest of the
covid-19 situation, however, it seems unlikely before some major causality.
And Huawei seems to be in the center of the stage.

------
tanilama
TSMC had denied this through Chinese media.

Might need to wait for sometime to see exactly what its position in all these.

My bet it will eventually comply but leave some vagueness here and there.
After all, hurting TSMC is hurting the world.

~~~
Nokinside
The timing of this with the mixed messages makes me think that Washington
tried to dupe TSMC/Taiwan.

Washington waited until the new fab deal was done before putting TSMC into
crossfire. If that's the case, it probably backfires and the US must make hard
choices.

------
DevKoala
I always thought that enforcing IP rights overseas was a pipe dream. Amazing.

~~~
est
How is Huawei violating America's IP exactly? Huawei stole 5G from US?

~~~
snovv_crash
They sold tech to Iran despite embargoes.

~~~
oblio
And that's violating IP exactly how? :-)

~~~
snovv_crash
The tech that they sold included US IP. So now they fall under some of the
same embargo rules.

------
trixie_
Can we get the TSMC fab built in America first before stirring things up?

~~~
dannyw
TSMC's fab is in Taiwan, not PRC.

Given the critical nature of semiconductors, if China invaded Taiwan it's hard
to see the US not getting involved.

TSMC is Taiwan's largest company.

~~~
fluffything
> if China invaded Taiwan it's hard to see the US not getting involved.

It's pretty much impossible to see the US getting involved.

The UN doesn't recognize Taiwan as an independent country, so China would just
be exercising their authority over a chinese company, just like they do with
Huawei, Lenovo, and many others.

NATO couldn't help either, because the US is not being militarily attacked by
this. And well, the US has severed both their military ties with NATO, as well
as their political ties with all countries in NATO (Paris agreement, Iran
nuclear deal, tarifs, empty embassies, in bed with North Korea...). Also, many
NATO countries are in bed with China economically, building the new Silk
Road...

So... if China were to grab TSMC, and the US would try any kind of military
action, who would support the US ? Europe, Russia, South Korea, Japan, South
America, the Middle east, Australia, ... they would all stand by China. The US
has been screwing them over the last 4 years, while China has been giving them
money for them to return them the favor in a time like this.

Or do you imagine Trump going throughout the world kissing others asses to get
their support?

Yeah, no. If Trump was "brave" enough to take military action, it would be
game over before it even starts: world-wide embargo against the US, all US
international companies assets frozen, the S&P500 would hit zero in a matter
of days, inflation would explode, the troops wouldn't be getting paid, etc.
The largest military force in the world would crumble in a week before even
taking the first shot.

~~~
someperson
Well the United States illegally invaded Iraq in 2003 without UN approval
(with the pretense that Saddam Hussein was developing weapons of mass
destruction, which turned out to be false), and managed to get the United
Kingdom, Spain, Australia and Poland along for the illegal ride.

Taiwan has a vibrant democracy and is highly regarded internationally. If
China invades Taiwan, the resulting coalition will look more like the 2001
invasion of Afganistan in Operation Enduring Freedom [1], with United States
and other NATO members attacking military assets on China's mainland to
neutralize the invasion.

The risk of even a small scale nuclear exchange is huge, and so is the risk it
will escalate into a Third World War with billions dead.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participants_in_Operation_Endu...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participants_in_Operation_Enduring_Freedom)

~~~
trixie_
Not sure if you realize that 'Operation Enduring Freedom' is regarded to as a
joke. A '40 country coalition' to invade two countries with no means of
protecting themselves. It was like stepping on an anthill.

I can't comprehend how you wrote this sentence, 'attacking military assets on
China's mainland to neutralize the invasion' What galaxy do you live in where
you think this would ever happen?

------
chvid
By the looks of it, this is major news and a big escalation of the US China
"trade" war. But I notice this:

"TSMC shares in Taiwan were down more than 2% in Monday morning trade, while
the benchmark index was down less than 1%."

So the market seems to think that is probably not such a big deal or guesses
that a solution/workaround will be found. Also that the US may cut-off TSMC
supplies to Huawei has been rumoured for about a year now and is an extension
of the restrictions on Google software/services and the ARM chip designs.

------
russli1993
“Despite the Entity List actions the Department took last year, Huawei and its
foreign affiliates have stepped-up efforts to undermine these national
security-based restrictions through an indigenization effort. However, that
effort is still dependent on U.S. technologies,” said Secretary of Commerce
Wilbur Ross. “This is not how a responsible global corporate citizen behaves.
We must amend our rules exploited by Huawei and HiSilicon and prevent U.S.
technologies from enabling malign activities contrary to U.S. national
security and foreign policy interests.”

What? You just tried to bankrupt company by cutting off all of their suppliers
and partners of business. Of course they will try to survive by trying to
self-reliant. The company employs 100,000 people, is super important to the
local economy and employment in the shenzhen area, and has over 50% of the
shares in China's entire core internet infrastructure. If Huawei does not get
the supply it needs, it cannot serve the entire China's core internet, do you
know how much danger that causes to China's communication infrastructure
security? How much economic damage to the country it's going to be? This
actually directly harms China's national security. Whereas the US claims
Huawei harms its national security, when Huawei is not even in the US. When
Huawei gets killed off, how do you tell the workers of Huawei and their
families, that their livelihood is gone because by its killed of by you, which
is a foreign government to them. Are you sure you can deal with the anti-
American sentiment afterwards. There is a saying in Chinese "cut of the way
someone earns money is equal to killing their parents" （断人财路如杀人父母）You also
know that the average Chinese person is super proud of Huawei as a brand
right?

This rule change effectively forces all companies in the world that is in the
semiconductor industry to abide by US governments wishes. TSMC 7nm processes
has less then 10% of US IP and technology. It was developed by Taiwan people
with TSMC own investment. But they invariably could use a technology that is
in the ERA. Hell, Intel processors is one, and god forbid if the production
line has a computer that contains Intel chips. You could argue that this Intel
chip assisted in producing Huawei's chip no? Where do you draw the line? The
US government can just decide how to enforce this based on their feelings of
the day? Are you sure this the standard for international justice?

For alleged IP infringement against Huawei, get the evidence and sue the
company at court. I am all for it, as long as there is trial. So far there are
two cases IP infringement cases that I know of, 1 in 2003 with Cisco that
settled out of court. 2 with T-mobile in 2013 with regarding a phone testing
arm. But Huawei's main business is base bands, routers, and consumer
electronics. By the way, Ercission has cross licence agreement with Huawei to
access Huawei's 5G patents. Huawei has many invention patents in 5G, that is
recognized globally. I don't get where the theft of IP comes from that warrant
the company to be killed off.

For security issues. Let the market decide, let the customer decide. Customer
should be able to make a comprehensive product selection process based on
their needs. And if the market says no to Huawei, then Huawei is dead. But let
the market decide. US companies can also compete with Huawei, and say they are
more secure. Huawei sucks. That is all fine. And I am also fine with the US
government producing security assessments on Huawei, and telling every country
on earth to not use Huawei equipment. That is US government's right. But at
least the customer can decide for themselves if Huawei is worth anything. If
Huawei is dead because of that, then sure. Its all fair and square. The US can
also form alliances with other countries and make sure the country ban Huawei
equipment in their countries too. That is the US right too. There are so many
ways to compete with Huawei.

US gov's action is as if, China ordered that every country in the world shall
not do business with Microsoft, and forces Microsoft to go bankrupt right now.
Imagine if the Microsoft cloud and office365 stops running because of that. US
would probably sent warplanes to China by then.

Huawei's 4G technology worked really well for China's environment and was
affordable for mass development. It is key enabler in allowing the country to
deploy 4G to almost everywhere in China, even the remote villages. This
enabled everyone with smartphone to use the internet. And as result, services
like mobile payment, shopping, gaming all flourished in China. It in turns
create a massive cellphone market in China. Apple, Qualcomn, Xllinx, and host
of consumer product providers, or Huawei's US suppliers all benefited from
this. Competitions in the phone space also pushed the innovation and pricing
for smart phones. Huawei was one of the first to push smartphone camera
quality and added multi-focal lengths to phones. It pushed Apple and Samsung
to innovate on cameras too, look at where smartphone photography has become. I
believe US and Chinese technology companies can work together in their
respective markets, to make technology more useful, enrich the economy, and
make people's lives better. Its not a zero sum game. But the US government is
viewing it as such. If US wants to win, China must lose.

With the US government essentially taking the world's companies into hostage
in killing off Huawei, I am not sure if US Gov is being a responsible world
citizen.

------
augustt
Wow. Can someone more familiar with stuff explain how much of a big deal this
is? Does this completely kneecap Huawei/China?

~~~
dannyw
In the immediate future, Huawei will be fine:

> Huawei has been preparing for such a move by the U.S. since the end of last
> year, including stockpiling more than a year's worth of networking
> equipment-related chips, especially for its crucial telecom equipment and
> carrier business, sources told Nikkei Asian Review.

~~~
Polylactic_acid
And in the distant future, all common chips and designs will be made without
the US.

------
ngcc_hk
Let us all free trade for all, but not china can trade with works but the
world cannot trade with China.

------
synaesthesisx
As someone long Qualcomm this is excellent news.

~~~
dannyw
Why? Qualcomm is a US company, subject to the same export restrictions.

~~~
lwneal
Qualcomm and Huawei are both "fabless" semiconductor companies, like NVidia or
AMD. These companies design chips, but do not own foundries to manufacture
them. TSMC is a "pure-play foundry", a company that does not design chips, but
only manufactures chips that other companies have designed. TSMC is the
largest and most advanced foundry.

Huawei (a Chinese company) and Qualcomm (a US company) both design modems[1].
Huawei and Qualcomm both need TSMC's fabs, or else they will not be able to
manufacture their most advanced designs. If Huawei can't buy from TSMC, then
new Huawei modems will have to be manufactured with inferior or more expensive
alternatives.

With Huawei chips now more expensive or less performant, products designed by
Qualcomm will be better in comparison. Presumably, this will cause Qualcomm's
stock to rise in value, although it may be a net negative for the worldwide
economy.

See also the recent announcement that TSMC reached an agreement with the US
government to move some of its production to Arizona [2].

[1] Huawei's Kirin/Balong chips directly compete with Qualcomm's Snapdragon
chips: both are currently manufactured on TSMC's 7nm process.

[2]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23187698](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23187698)

------
whoevercares
Good move for China. Time to spawn our own IC industry

------
forgot_again
Escalation between the US and China is inevitable.

China is fundamentally opposed to everything the US and Democracies around the
world stand for politically. Likewise, the US and friends are fundamentally
opposed to everything China stands for politically. There is no Universe in
which two diametrically opposed juggernauts do not come into conflict.
Conflict is simply inevitable when the stakes are this high and there is no
greater power able to force deescalation.

Either China converts to Democracy or the US and friends adopt Chinese style
authoritarianism, or one of the two belligerents collapses either on its own
in the manner of the Soviet Union, or by force.

~~~
harpratap
I don't think it will be such a dramatic shift. It will be more of a middle
ground IMO. The mega corporations of US will be regulated by the government
just like it happens in China. And China will end up with more rights and
transperancy like a democracy.

~~~
bsder
> And China will end up with more rights and transperancy like a democracy.

I see _no_ timeline in which this happens short of Xi Jinping catching
coronavirus and dying.

China is headed into "What is best for Xi Jinping" rather than "What is best
for China". Lysenkoism is coming.

~~~
bilbo0s
> _I see no timeline in which this happens short of Xi Jinping catching
> coronavirus and dying._

Yeah, I don't see it happening then either.

But it certainly isn't gonna happen after an enormous market opens up for
domestic competitors.

