China tries to close Singapore route for AI developments – Winston Ma

 

Winston ma

China is trying to close a route for Chinese companies to work through Singapore to collaborate with the US, says political analyst Winston Ma, author of The Digital War: How China’s Tech Power Shapes the Future of AI, Blockchain and Cyberspace, to Newsweek. By banning Meta from purchasing AI startup Manus, China wants to avoid national security issues on AI and other Chinese innovations, he adds.

Newsweek:

The exit bans send a message—that any AI company founded in China, with business operations still in the country, are likewise reachable by Beijing, Ke Yan, head of Singapore’s DZT Research, told Newsweek.

Beijing’s regulators then treat the deal as a technology export, arguing that the team, model weights, and training data were developed in China, regardless of where the company is legally based.

“Once they were physically in China, Singapore’s corporate domicile became irrelevant,” he said.

Beijing is most concerned on whether strategically sensitive technologies developed in China—and the talent and data behind them—continue to be transferred offshore through corporate restructuring in Singapore, Winston Ma, New York University law school adjunct professor and the author of The Digital War, told Newsweek.

The Chinese authorities have made clear this “Singapore washing” will not automatically insulate any deal from government oversight, Ma stated.

“The real challenge is defining what counts as ‘strategic’ in a fast-moving AI landscape—much like how TikTok’s seemingly goofy videos initially appeared far removed from national security concerns—until their underlying data and algorithmic power came into sharper focus.”

More at Newsweek.

Winston Ma is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers’ request form.

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Guiding foreign companies through spying and national security accusations – Gabor Holch

 

Gabor Holch

China is taking a stricter line when it comes to national security and spying when it comes to foreign companies, including raids of the consultancies Bain and Capvision offices in China. Intercultural leadership coach Gabor Holch guides those foreign firms through the intercultural minefield, he tells in the South China Morning Post, in an article about the last warnings,

The South China Morning Post:

Gabor Holch, an intercultural leadership consultant in Shanghai, said steering round sensitive issues had been part of doing business in China since the early 2000s.

“I personally helped many corporate leaders navigate this minefield, from obvious political taboos to minute references such as country lists and images in brochures,” said Holch, who is also an author of a forthcoming book on foreign managers in China.

“In past decades, definitions of strictly off-limits topics became clearer and embedded in published laws, something that was missing in the early days.”

He said that nowadays executives had to be more “vigilant than before to avoid sensitive issues that can put their firms in jeopardy”…

Holch said: “Foreign firms must make sure to appoint politically able and well-informed, preferably Mandarin-speaking, executives to their [Chinese] businesses as opposed to technical problem-solvers typical a decade ago.

“Most importantly, China’s restrictive information environment demands that foreign and local managers at multinationals share information and keep their firms agile but legally compliant.”

More at the South China Morning Post.

Gabor Holch is a speaker at the China Speakers Bureau. Do you need him at your meeting or conference? Do get in touch or fill in our speakers’ request form.

Are you looking for more strategic experts at the China Speakers Bureau? Do check out this list.