The Biden administration this week introduced new export restrictions intended to control progress in AI globally and ultimately prevent the most advanced AI from falling into the hands of China . This rule is just the latest in a series of measures put in place by Donald Trump and Joe Biden to control Chinese AI.
With prominent figures in AI, including OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, warning of the need to “beat China” in AI, the Trump administration may well step things up even further .
Paul Triolo is a partner at DGA Group, an international consulting firm, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a senior advisor to the Penn Project at the University of Pennsylvania on the future of U.S.-China relations. Alvin Graylin is an entrepreneur who previously led the China operations of Taiwanese electronics company HPC. Together, they tracked China’s AI industry and the impact of U.S. sanctions. In an email exchange, Triolo and Graylin discussed the latest sanctions, Silicon Valley rhetoric and the dangers of viewing global AI as a zero-sum game.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
What do you think of the new AI diffusion rule adopted this week by the US government, which aims to restrict China’s access to AI?
Paul Triolo: Typically this focuses on high-performance computing clusters. The rule also imposes controls on proprietary model weights for the most advanced “frontier” models, but it is unclear how performance levels will be determined, and most open-weighted (freely weighted) AI models shared) are tuned and improved by users, including large AI companies. in China.
The complex rule and unclear compliance requirements inject considerable uncertainty into the long-term plans of large and mid-sized U.S. and Western hyperscalers.
For hyperscalers like Google, Microsoft, AWS, and Oracle, the rule introduces critical issues, including slowed or more complex international development, new compliance and legal costs, impact on global R&D, and uncertain application requirements.
How have previous measures, including sanctions introduced by the first Trump administration, affected the AI industry in this country?
Paul Triolo: U.S. export controls have slowed China down, but at a high level, sanctions have unified the Chinese government’s will and efforts to become more self-reliant. It has invested tens of billions to help local players catch up technologically or increase their capabilities in key areas, leading to significant changes within the semiconductor industry and its ability to support supports advanced hardware to develop cutting-edge AI models.
Chinese AI developers have become very good at leveraging AI hardware inherited from Western companies and gradually integrating domestic alternatives into their development process. Chinese companies will continue to innovate in AI hardware and software, even if not at the pace of their Western counterparts.
Why do you think so many people in Silicon Valley are now talking about the need to “beat China” in AI?
Paul Triolo: There is a growing connection between conservative venture capitalists, primarily located in Silicon Valley, and technology companies whose business models depend on the China threat. It’s a troubling combination that combines the Chinese threat, personal gain, and resistance to regulating advanced AI. It also presents the competition between the United States and China around AI as zero-sum, which is particularly dangerous.
