The White House. Stock image. <\/p>\n
The US will seek agreements with eight allied nations as part of a fresh effort to strengthen supply chains for the computer chips and critical minerals needed for AI technology, according to the top State Department official for economic affairs.<\/p>\n
The initiative, which builds on efforts dating back to the first Trump administration, unfolds as the US looks to cut dependence on China. It will begin with a meeting at the White House on Dec. 12 between the US and counterparts from Japan, South Korea, Singapore, the Netherlands, the UK, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Australia, Jacob Helberg, the undersecretary of state for economic affairs, said in an interview.<\/p>\n
Helberg, a former adviser at Palantir Technologies Inc., said the summit will focus on reaching agreements across the areas of energy, critical minerals, advanced manufacturing semiconductors, AI infrastructure, and transportation logistics.<\/p>\n
Helberg said the countries were chosen for reasons that range from being home to some of the most important semiconductor companies to their critical minerals resources.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s clear that right now in AI, it\u2019s a two-horse race \u2014 it\u2019s the US and China,\u201d Helberg said. \u201cWe want to have a positive, stable relationship with China, but we\u2019re also ready to compete, and we want to make sure that our companies can continue building transformative technologies without being subject to coercive dependencies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Helberg\u2019s initiative builds upon years of efforts on critical minerals supply chains by prior administrations largely aimed at helping reduce western dependence on China. The State Department in the first Trump administration launched the US Energy Resource Governance Initiative with the aim of securing supply chains for critical minerals like lithium and cobalt. The Biden administration launched a Minerals Security Partnership that aimed to funnel foreign investment and western expertise to the mining sectors of developing nations.<\/p>\n
Even so, the US and other countries have been unable to break China\u2019s stranglehold over rare earths supplies. China is home to more than 90% of global rare earths and permanent magnets refining capacity, compared with just 4% for second-place Malaysia, according to the International Energy Agency, a Paris-based intergovernmental organization.<\/p>\n