Witnesses Ask Banking Panel for New US Tack on China in Chips, 5G

It's not enough to restrict sales of chips to Huawei, and convince allies not to use the Chinese company in their 5G networks, experts said at a Senate Banking Committee Economic Policy Subcommittee hearing Wednesday. Rather, they testified, both 5G and export controls should be looked at more broadly. Martijn Rasser, senior fellow in the Center for a New American Security's Technology and National Security Program, said 5G networks will be essential to all the U.S. does in technology, so getting it right is urgent. Of talk of the U.S. buying an equity stake in Nokia or Ericsson, or creating its own "national champion" company in telecom equipment, that's "nibbling at the edges of the question," he said: Networking is an oligopoly, "which is why I’m advocating for a whole new approach." Rasser suggests the U.S. should convince allies to support open radio access networks. He said U.S. companies are strong in software, and this approach would make the industry more competitive. Tim Morrison, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, said the way to win the economic competition with China is through a trade agreement similar to the Trans Pacific Partnership, leaving developing countries out except Mexico, and adding the U.K. and South Korea. Michigan State University Economics professor Lisa Cook, who agrees intellectual property theft is a problem in China, said it's ironic, because Chinese inventors are receiving more and more U.S. patents to protect their own innovations. "On the other hand, when I was in China," she said, the people she met told her because China "is a developing country, it deserves to have intellectual property rights abrogated." Rasser said export controls on semiconductors aren't as effective as putting them on chipmaking equipment. China's embassy didn't comment.