Don’t Restrict US Participation in RISC-V Chip Standards Talks, ITIF Says

Stopping U.S. firms from participating in RISC-V, an open-source semiconductor architecture that policymakers fear China will use to evade export controls, would only hurt American innovation and competitiveness, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation said this month.

The ITIF blog post, written by Associate Director of Trade Policy Nigel Cory, was published about eight months after the House Select Committee on China called on Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo to take “urgent action” to prevent U.S. technology and expertise from being shared with Chinese counterparts during RISC-V standards discussions.

Cory said it appears some U.S. policymakers “misunderstand” how RISC-V operates and what happens at standards discussions. He said some U.S. officials think those talks “involve the disclosure of confidential information about technology; in essence, that it involves the transfer of sensitive technology and know-how.” But they instead usually “involve discussions about technical functionality,” he wrote. “In the case of RISC-V, it provides a standard to allow different firms to write software so that it will run on any product that complies with” the complex interface “between the software and hardware of semiconductors that tells the ‘chip’ what to do.”

The RISC-V standard “does not involve sensitive technology,” ITIF said. Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology made similar points in January, suggesting the U.S. consider supporting instead of restricting the development of RISC-V (see 2401230058). And even if the U.S. were to place export controls on U.S. persons' involvement in RISC-V, CSET said RISC-V standards development would likely continue, and the U.S. would cede leadership in the tech standard to China.

ITIF said that if U.S. firms were prevented from participating in RISC-V, American companies likely would be forced to use a “U.S.-only RISC-V while the rest of the world uses the open, global version.” U.S. companies also would have to “devote significant resources and expertise to developing already hugely expensive semiconductors to two different standards.”

Although the foundation said it isn’t yet clear “which semiconductor architecture will lead the market in the future,” U.S. companies should be allowed to continue contributing to RISC-V.

“The open nature of RISC-V, and the ecosystem of firms involved in it, means that no one controls it,” ITIF said. “This means that it’s difficult to apply sanctions and export controls to try and stop it.”

The group added: “U.S. policymakers, especially national security officials, should not automatically equate Chinese participation in technical standards with being a national security risk.”

U.S. industry has long warned the government about how uncertainty around export controls could prevent American companies from participating in international standards-setting bodies and cede leadership within those bodies to China (see 2202100039). The Bureau of Industry and Security issued a new rule last week that it said addressed some of those concerns (see 2407170025).