Arm CEO Warns US Can’t Easily Ban AI CPU Exports to China

Arm CEO said the United States would struggle to ban AI-capable CPU exports to China because CPUs are too general purpose.

An AI server assembly station is displayed at the Century Trading Corporation booth during the Semicon Taiwan exhibition in Taipei on Sept. 10, 2025. I-Hwa Cheng / AFP via Getty Images

Arm Holdings CEO Rene Haas has said the United States would find it difficult to block exports to China of central processing units, or CPUs, that can support artificial intelligence workloads.

CPUs are general-purpose chips used in a wide range of computers and devices. Unlike more specialized graphics chips, they are harder to restrict based on AI-related use cases alone, Haas said in a Reuters interview.