China proposes export controls on AI models, agents and computing technology

China’s Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Science and Technology published Announcement No. 48, proposing to add 40 technologies to the catalogue of technologies prohibited or restricted from export. Twenty-three are in artificial intelligence (large models, AI agents, computing clusters and information processing), five in biomedicine and twelve in photovoltaics. Public comment is open from 16 October to 15 November 2026.

The catalogue changes are a draft, but one part is not. The announcement says that, from the day it was published until a revised catalogue takes effect, exporters of the listed technologies must register with the ministry beforehand. That covers transferring ownership abroad, licensing technology for overseas use, handing a domestic technology’s owner or actual controller to a foreign entity, and any other case the ministry specifies. Exports already under way but not completed fall within scope. Technologies already public through open-source release or academic publication are excluded.

Model thresholds sit in the draft annex rather than the announcement text. ChinaTalk’s analysis reported that a model’s core technology would be controlled if it met any one of three tests: at least 10^26 floating-point operations, at least two trillion parameters, or “globally leading” capability. It also reported a split of 14 prohibited and 26 restricted items. It flagged undefined terms, including “open source”, and noted that comments could narrow, expand or drop entries.

The practical reach was disputed from the start. The South China Morning Post reported that a ministry spokesperson said overseas access to Chinese models through APIs, websites and apps would not be covered, and that open-sourcing would get expedited “automatic licensing”. On 23 October, Bloomberg reported that DeepSeek and MiniMax had “won approval” to deploy models overseas, citing Yuyuan Tantian, a social-media account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV. The South China Morning Post’s account of the same post was narrower: the two companies had “completed export registration procedures” and proceeded with open-source releases. Neither report cited a ministry statement, and registration is not the same as a licence.

The measure follows Beijing’s forced unwinding of Meta’s Manus acquisition, and ChinaTalk read it as extending that principle to technology transfer. Four days later the US Department of Homeland Security ordered DeepSeek products removed from federal civilian systems. The final catalogue, and whether open-weight releases stay effectively exempt, remain open until the comment period closes.