Flags of China and U.S. are displayed on a printed circuit board with semiconductor chips, in this illustration picture taken February 17, 2023. REUTERS/Florence Lo/Illustration/File Photo Acquire Licensing RightsWASHINGTON, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Chinese companies are buying up U.S. chipmaking equipment to make advanced semiconductors, despite a raft of new export curbs aimed at thwarting advances in the country's semiconductor industry, a congressional report said on Tuesday. China watchers had theorized that SMIC could have made the chip with equipment obtained prior to the October 2022 rules, but it had other options for obtaining the equipment from oversees, the report shows. The United States managed to plug a key loophole in its efforts to stymie China's access to advanced chipmaking tools by convincing allies Japan and the Netherlands, with similarly robust chipmaking equipment industries, to announce their own restrictions on exports of the coveted technology. China's imports of semiconductor equipment from all countries totaled $13.8 billion (RMB 100 billion) over the first eight months of 2023, it added.

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Persons: Florence Lo, United States scrambles, SMIC, Alexandra Alper, Chizu Organizations: REUTERS, Rights, U.S, Biden, Commerce Department, Huawei, SMIC, United, Office, Thomson Locations: China, U.S, United States, Netherlands, Japan