Tencent, CATL added to US Department of Defense’s list of companies working with China’s military

Hong Kong CNN — The US Department of Defense has added Chinese tech companies Tencent, a social media and gaming giant, and CATL, the world’s largest battery maker, to a list of firms that it alleges work with China’s military. They join dozens of other alleged Chinese military companies on the list that the Defense Department alleges operate directly or indirectly in the US, according to a notice posted to the Federal Register on Monday. The Pentagon has said the so-called 1260H list, which is updated annually, is “an important continuing effort” in highlighting and countering China’s “military-civil fusion” strategy, a goal to develop the most technologically advanced military in the world by eliminating barriers between the country’s civilian research and commercial sectors and its armed forces. “US companies that have important partnerships with large Chinese companies, like Ford with CATL, need to understand that the regulatory, economic, and PR risks of these partnerships will continue to grow.” Ivan Su, a senior equity analyst at Morningstar, said that given Tencent’s business model, which focuses on social media and gaming, it “has a good chance to secure exclusion through US courts,” like Chinese consumer electronics maker Xiaomi managed to do in 2021 in a separate case.