TL;DR
China's commerce and science ministries published Announcement No. 48, a draft plan to add 40 technologies to its export-control catalogue — 14 banned outright, 26 restricted. Twenty-three of the categories cover AI, including foundation models, intelligent agents, and computing clusters. Public comment runs through November 15, with interim pre-export registration starting now; already-open-sourced tech stays exempt.
What Beijing just put on the table
On Friday, October 16, China's Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Science and Technology published a draft revision — Announcement No. 48 — to the catalogue of technologies prohibited or restricted from export. It covers 40 key technologies across AI, biomedicine, and photovoltaics: 14 proposed for a complete export ban, 26 for restricted export under license.
Public opinions are being sought on the draft until November 15, and China is simultaneously implementing interim pre-export registration management for the affected technologies. In other words: the rules bite in stages, but the paperwork starts now.
The AI slice: models, agents, clusters
Twenty-three of the 40 categories are AI technologies, covering foundation models, intelligent agents, computing clusters, and information-processing technologies. Reuters notes these are, by any measure, the three fundamental building blocks of China's AI industry — the draft doesn't nibble around the edges, it goes at the core stack.
The outright-ban list includes AI-driven technology that could be used to generate and mutate malicious code, alongside perovskite and tandem solar-cell module manufacturing tech and some cell and gene therapy platforms. The restricted list covers another 26 technologies. A ministry spokesperson said that while most AI technologies will continue to be freely exportable, the additions are the ones with the sharpest dual-use edge.
Why they're doing it, in their words
"In recent years, AI, biomedicine and photovoltaic technologies have seen expanding applications in sensitive fields," a Ministry of Commerce spokesperson said. "Major economies around the world have implemented varying degrees of export controls in these areas. Drawing on international practice, China is implementing necessary controls in accordance with the law to prevent risks arising from loss of control over technologies or inappropriate proliferation, while also safeguarding normal international technological cooperation."
On the AI controls specifically, the statement said technologies such as autonomous malicious-code generation and mutation could be used to target critical infrastructure, defense systems, and core government networks — "China's objective is to establish security safeguards, prevent misuse and ensure that AI remains under human control." The ministry added that the move was routine and does not target any specific country, region, or entity.
The carve-outs — and who this hits
Beijing left itself room: the statement says China remains "committed to building an open-source AI innovation ecosystem," with open-source AI projects and overseas chip fabrication eligible for facilitation measures, and technologies already in the public domain through open-source publication or academic papers "generally exempt from export controls." Only a limited set of technologies would be regulated, and other technologies would remain freely exportable.
The timing is hard to ignore. The same day, Taiwan formally criminalized the export of advanced chips and servers to China, and Beijing's guidance is another ratchet in the US-China tech decoupling — coming days after Reuters reporting that Chinese AI developers publish safety tests for just 3.6% of model releases. What to watch: comments close November 15, then the final list lands. If your stack depends on Chinese open-weight models like Qwen or Kimi, the final text — not the draft — is what decides whether your supply chain changes.