ChinaTalk 解读中国商务部 AI 技术出口管制新规草案

In the AI race thus far, openness has been China’s secret sauce. As fast followers to the frontier, Chinese AI companies have gained trust by publicizing their weights and architectures. And at the cost of revenue, they have achieved global adoption, brand recognition, and a truly competitive dynamic with American labs.

Last week, China’s Ministries of Commerce (MOFCOM) and Science and Technology (MOST) [jointly proposed](https://www.mofcom.gov.cn/zwgk/zcfb/art/2026/art_0a31a3c9ac404f7a9b0e917ce3412997.html) expanding China’s catalogue of export-controlled technologies, with most of the proposed regulations taking aim at subsets of China’s AI industry. Regulators will spend a month taking comments on the draft before anything becomes law, but we can already learn a ton from this announcement in its current form.

Does Beijing want to hold back the tides of open models? Why is MOFCOM writing these rules now, and what does this say about the Chinese government’s appetite for AI-enabled risks versus growth?

To find out, we spent three days poring over the draft regulations — so you don’t have to!

What’s ahead:

- How these rules came to be — and how this draft is already affecting the Chinese AI industry; - What the proposed rules mean for frontier models, chip design, memory, cybersecurity, AI content detection, and even China’s minority languages; - Who actually decides which export licenses get approved, and the balance of power between provincial and central authorities; - What these rules tell us about Beijing’s expectations for AI development.

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The 40 proposed additions in Announcement 48, split across AI, photovoltaics, and biomedicine.

_Today, we’re just focusing on the AI-related regulations, but a future piece tackling everything else — from this announcement’s proposed restrictions on PV cells and gene therapies, to other recent announcements on port dredgers and tunnel borers — is in the works! Subscribe so you don’t miss it:_

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