Bardia Ebrahimi – Technology Affairs Expert

Export Control Regimes; From Strategy to Contradictory Profit-Seeking

Since 2022, the United States has attempted to limit China’s technological progress in the field of advanced semiconductors and artificial intelligence by adopting targeted export restrictions. However, the approach of the second Trump administration toward this issue has been accompanied by serious contradictions. In August 2025, the Trump administration reached an agreement with NVIDIA and AMD, according to which these two companies could resume sales of advanced AI chips to China, provided that 15 percent of the resulting revenue would go to the US Treasury. This agreement, which was later completed by increasing the share to 25 percent for more advanced chips, indicates the prioritization of short-term financial interests over a coherent technological strategy.

In January 2026, the Bureau of Industry and Security of the US Department of Commerce changed its policy from a “presumption of denial” for requests to export advanced chips to China to a “case-by-case review” process. This change, which was accompanied by the imposition of a 25 percent tariff on some advanced chips under Section 232, has in practice meant selling access to advanced technology in exchange for receiving a share of the revenue.

Based on these developments, analysts believe that the United States lacks a coherent strategy in technological competition with China, and the administration’s transaction-oriented approach has disrupted investment in research and development and supply chain resilience.

The Atlantic think tank has acknowledged in a report that export controls on advanced chips, although they have slowed the “pace” of China’s AI progress, have not been able to stop it. Chinese companies such as DeepSeek, Alibaba, and MoonShot have demonstrated that they can continue innovating within the space of restrictions.

Furthermore, the CEO of Arm Holdings has acknowledged that restricting the export of AI-based central processing units to China is “nearly impossible,” since these chips have widespread applications and identifying their end use is difficult. This situation indicates that Washington’s pressure tools, despite enormous costs for the US chip industry and reduced competitiveness of smaller companies, have not been able to achieve their strategic objective, namely the complete halt of China’s technological progress.

From China’s Chip Self-sufficiency to Dominance in Robotics

In response to US restrictions, Beijing has pursued its “technological self-sufficiency” strategy more seriously. China’s five-year plans have defined artificial intelligence not as an independent industry, but as “a capability that must be deeply integrated with production.” In the semiconductor field, the priority has shifted from “comprehensive substitution” to “deployable capability.” One of the newest initiatives in this regard is the “AI for Chip” program of the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (E-Town), which aims to use artificial intelligence across the entire semiconductor value chain to accelerate the chip design and production process. This program indicates that China is attempting to compensate for part of its technological gap with the West by leveraging artificial intelligence.

In the field of robotics, China has made remarkable progress. According to the report of the 2026 World Robot Conference, China produced over 40,000 humanoid robots in the first half of 2026, constituting 97 percent of total global shipments. The China Electronics Institute has predicted that the market value of this industry will reach approximately 128 billion dollars by 2030. These achievements indicate that China, despite restrictions on access to advanced chips, has found an alternative path to maintain its technological growth. At the same time, Beijing has expanded its technological influence globally by using open-source AI models. The Atlantic think tank report has acknowledged that Chinese models are widely used across the world, including by American companies, and this has created dependence on “technical ecosystems of Chinese origin.”

Implications of the Beijing-Washington Competition for Regional Countries

The technological competition between the United States and China has placed regional countries, including Iran, in a difficult position. On one hand, Washington has increased pressure on Tehran by imposing secondary sanctions on Chinese entities that cooperate with Iran, through restricting access to foreign technologies. On the other hand, Chinese companies seeking alternative markets for their products can become important partners for Iran in the technology field. Analysts believe that the intensification of technological competition could lead to a “cold balance in technology” that provides Iran with the possibility of maintaining technological engagement without escalating crises.

The technology war taking shape is not a simple confrontation, but a fundamental redefinition of the global economic order. The Atlantic think tank report explicitly refers to the “AI supply chain” as the “new front of geopolitical competition” and describes the goal as “preserving unipolar control in a multipolar world.” This approach, which emphasizes “supply chain and production sovereignty,” indicates that the competition over chips and artificial intelligence, beyond being a technical dispute, has become an arena for determining the role of great powers in the future order. In this context, countries that can maintain their relative technological independence while simultaneously benefiting from the existing gaps in the competition between the two powers will have a greater chance of survival in this new order.