The chip crisis between the US and China is hurting Russia

Poco after the outbreak of the conflict with Ukraine, many tech companies have more or less openly taken sides against the Russia. Many companies they have chosen to abandon the Russian market, casting shadows on what the nation's technological progress will be. There has even been talk of the possible detachment from the global web network by Russia, as well as the creation of alternatives to American platforms, as in the case of Instagram and Google Play Store. But when it comes to the technological clash, we can't help but talk about how the chip crisis is in its own way underlining the geopolitical boundaries between the parties involved.

This is how Russia is penalized by the fight against the chip crisis between the US and China

Let's start by saying that the semiconductor crisis was penalized precisely by the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, which has affected the supply chain of raw materials necessary for the construction of the chips. In this scenario, we cannot fail to consider the technological struggle between the US and China, today more than ever exacerbated by the political tensions between West and East. After the blockades implemented by the Trump presidency, in particular the one against Huawei, with the Biden presidency we have seen a tightening of the restrictions against the nation led by Xi Jinping. China is catching up more and more blocked from the free trade of semiconductors, as the United States wants to prevent any company in the world from selling them technologies based on American patents.

In addition to heavily blocking the Chinese chip industry, these blockades implemented by the United States are also putting a strain on Russia, which historically has often relied on China to compensate for its technological backwardness. Not by chance, poco after the outbreak of the conflict, the USA they lobbied on the Chinese chip giant, SMIC, lest he provide chips to Russia.

Now that eight months have passed since the attack on Ukraine, the first conclusions are being drawn about the effects in Russia of the chip challenge between the US and China. As reported by the Russian newspaper Kommersant, the rate of defective chips sent from China to Russia it would pass by 2% before March to 40%. An important growth, which underlines how much the sanctions of the NATO front would affect the effectiveness of the eastern technology market. With no longer access to foreign (mostly American) importers for machinery, software and chip-related projects, Russian companies would have found themselves forced to turn to unauthorized suppliers, often obtaining inferior quality products.

According to the report by the Mercator Institute for China Studies, there was a big one from March to June + 209% boom in shipments to Russia by Chinese semiconductor manufacturers. However, according to analysts, this increase in defective chips would show that China is not really supporting Russia: "if Beijing had done that, semiconductors would probably have been THE field in which it would have provided support, and the quality of Russian chips would not have suffered as much.". The Russian Ministry of Industry and Trade responded to Kommersant's statements, saying they have no information about the defective chips from China.