U.S. stops granting export licenses for China's Huawei - sources

By Karen Freifeld, Alexandra Alper and Stephen Nellis

(Reuters) -The Biden administration has stopped approving licenses for U.S. companies to export most items to China's Huawei, according to three people familiar with the matter.

Huawei has faced U.S. export restrictions around items for 5G and other technologies for several years, but officials in the U.S. Department of Commerce have granted licenses for some American firms to sell certain goods and technologies to the company. Qualcomm Inc in 2020 received permission to sell 4G smartphone chips to Huawei.

A Commerce Department spokesperson said officials "continually assess our policies and regulations" but do not comment on talks with specific companies. Qualcomm declined to comment. Bloomberg and the Financial Times earlier reported the move.

One person familiar with the matter said U.S. officials are creating a new formal policy of denial for shipping items to Huawei that would include items below the 5G level, including 4G items, Wifi 6 and 7, artificial intelligence, and high-performance computing and cloud items.