Ouch, this is a mess for me. On April 24, the U.S. Senate passed a bill to ban Tiktok, which requires ByteDance to sell Tiktok, but only a few days later, the U.S. government has made another move, this time targeting the Chinese drone giant DJI. Shortly after Blinken left Beijing, the U.S. Congress began pushing a bill banning DJI drones from operating on U.S. communications infrastructure. I thought at the time, this is not what Sun Tzu said in the Art of War, "a soldier who surrenders without a fight", what a cunning!
As everyone knows, the competition between China and the United States in the field of science and technology can be described as a back-and-forth match, and no one wants to be left behind. The United States has always regarded Chinese technology companies as a "national security threat" and has sanctioned Huawei for five years, and now it is the turn of DJI, the "Huawei with wings". I wondered, why did DJI blacklist it because it had earned enough eyeballs in the U.S. market over the years? Could it be that it was jealous that DJI's products were so popular?
This doesn't happen overnight. As early as 2016, the U.S. Congress proposed a bill to restrict DJI drones on the grounds of so-called "cybersecurity". In 2017, the United States officially launched an investigation into DJI, and the army directly ordered all units to stop using DJI drones.
In the next few years, the U.S. crackdown on DJI snowballed. In 2018, the Ministry of Defense banned all subordinate units from purchasing and using DJI products; In 2019, it was decided to impose tariffs on DJI; In 2020, DJI was added to the "Entity List" to control its import and export.
Do you think that's enough? But the best is yet to come! Despite the crackdown, DJI's drone sales in the U.S. civilian market have increased instead of decreasing, with a market share of 80% in 2020. Seeing that his drone field was dominated by DJI, Lao Mei was quite unhappy. As a result, they first fined DJI $2.8 billion through a patent lawsuit; Now it is pushing for this no-fly bill, wanting to completely drive DJI drones out of the U.S. market.
However, I think Lao Mei's approach this time is a bit petty. Obviously because DJI's products are so popular, its own drones can't compare at all, but they have to throw the pot on the so-called "national security threat". Isn't this a typical "fox and fake tiger"? It's ridiculous!
However, DJI is not a vegetarian either. Founder Wang Tao once stated that DJI would never compromise with the United States and would rather withdraw from the American market. It seems that this kind of national integrity is not covered, which is admirable!
Overall, the U.S. crackdown on DJI has once again exposed its sinister intentions to maintain its technological monopoly. However, China's scientific and technological prowess is growing day by day, and any attempt to contain China's development is doomed to be futile.
I believe that the U.S. government should abandon prejudice and bullying mentality, and cooperate with Chinese companies on the basis of fair competition to jointly promote global scientific and technological progress. Otherwise, this kind of "gambling" will only hurt one's own interests in the end.
Finally, I would like to invite everyone to discuss this matter. Do you think the U.S. approach to DJI is reasonable, and what impact will it have on Sino-US scientific and technological cooperation? Welcome to speak freely in the comment area, let us contribute to the global scientific and technological development together!