US said to have revoked Qualcomm, Intel licences for exports to Huawei

The United States has revoked licences that allowed companies including Intel and Qualcomm to ship chips used for laptops and handsets to sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment maker Huawei Technologies, three people familiar with the matter said.

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A fourth person said some of the companies were notified on May 7 that their licences were revoked effective immediately. The US Commerce Department earlier in the day confirmed it had revoked some licences but stopped short of naming the companies.

A spokesperson for Intel declined to comment. Qualcomm did not respond to a request for comment, and Huawei did not immediately respond.

The move comes after the April release of Huawei's first artificial intelligence-enabled laptop, the MateBook X Pro, powered by Intel's new Core Ultra 9 processor.

The laptop launch drew fire from Republican lawmakers, who said it suggested to them that the Commerce Department had given the green light to Intel to sell the chip to Huawei.

"We have revoked certain licences for exports to Huawei," the Commerce Department said in a statement, declining to specify which ones it had withdrawn.