TECH NEWS – After the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) banned government employees from using Apple’s iPhone, the CCP has come up with another isolationist move to promote domestically produced technology.

The Financial Times reported that the CCP has banned government employees from using Intel and AMD processors in their computers, citing security reasons because the state party wants secure and reliable components. It has also recommended that township-level authorities not use Microsoft Windows as their primary operating system! (In the case of the latter, this can be circumvented by switching to any Linux distribution, so this suggestion is not so bad).

The Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has published a list of processors that comply with government regulations. Unsurprisingly, only Chinese manufacturers are on the list, and although they’re not named, it’s safe to say that Huawei and Phytium are at the top of the list. (The latter is only quoted as being independent of the CCP; there is plenty of evidence that Phytium has plenty of military ties…)

Intel and AMD will also see their position in the consumer market deteriorate if there is no temporary solution. In China, Intel has seen a 27% drop in sales in one year, while for Huawei and Loongson, a larger market share could spur innovation and R&D. US President Joe Biden is using the CHIPS Act to promote domestic chip manufacturing, allowing Intel, for example, to make processors (and graphics cards) in America.

And yet Apple CEO Tim Cook traveled to Beijing for the China Development Forum. Reuters reported that CCTV’s economic expert wrote on Weibo (the Chinese equivalent of Twitter) that the Apple Vision Pro will be released in China. The Chinese market is so important to Apple that they are kowtowing, just to get more money from this country.

Source: WCCFTech, Financial Times, Reuters,