The US Department of Defense has added several of China’s largest technology and industrial companies, including BYD, Alibaba and Baidu, to its list of firms it believes are supporting Beijing’s military, a move that could further strain relations between Washington and Beijing.
The updated list, released on Monday, replaces an earlier version published in early 2025 and comes less than a month after US President Donald Trump met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing, where both leaders maintained a fragile truce in the ongoing trade dispute.
Besides electric vehicle giant BYD, e-commerce leader Alibaba and search engine operator Baidu, the Pentagon also added memory chipmakers ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) and Yangtze Memory Technologies (YMTC), biotechnology company WuXi AppTec, robotics firms Unitree and RoboSense Technology, as well as several other Chinese technology-related companies.
The Pentagon said the companies qualify as “Chinese military companies” operating in the US and can petition for removal from the list. While the designation does not immediately impose sanctions, recent US legislation will prohibit the Defence Department from contracting directly with listed companies later this month and from purchasing their products or services through third parties beginning in 2027.
Several companies rejected the allegations. Alibaba said there was “no basis” for its inclusion and maintained it was neither a military company nor part of any military-civil fusion strategy. Baidu described the designation as “entirely baseless”, while WuXi AppTec said it would take immediate action to challenge the decision.
China’s embassy in Washington criticised the move, accusing the US of creating discriminatory lists targeting Chinese firms and calling for a fair and non-discriminatory business environment.
Analysts said the expanded list reflects Washington’s growing view that China’s broader technology ecosystem has become a strategic area of competition amid escalating geopolitical and security concerns between the world’s two largest economies.
