Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas), chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, holds a press conference at the U.S. Capitol following the Senate Republican leadership election on November 10, 2026.
Tom Williams | CQ-Roll Call Inc. | Getty Images
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) is calling on the Trump administration to be tougher on Chinese memory makers. Choshin Memory Technologies.
“CXMT, one of Communist China’s national memory chip champions, poses increasing risks to our nation’s economic prosperity and military superiority,” Cotton said in a letter to Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Thursday. “The United States must take action to prevent CXMT from gaining a stronger foothold in global markets.”
CXMT is the world’s fourth largest manufacturer of dynamic random access memory (DRAM), which underpins many basic functions in computers and smartphones.
In a letter first obtained by CNBC, Cotton asked Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to place CXMT on the department’s Bureau of Industry and Security’s Entity List, which would significantly limit the ability of U.S. companies to do business with the company.
“This basically means that a U.S. company is not allowed to do business with its physical public company, and that physical public company cannot access U.S. technology,” said Kyle Zhang, a fellow at the Brookings Institution who studies Chinese technology development.
MS Hwang, Counterpoint’s research director, told CNBC that DRAM is a “commodity,” meaning it is made to global standards and is generally compatible across manufacturers.
However, with appropriate manufacturing technology, it can also form the building block of HBM (High Bandwidth Memory). HBM is a highly sought-after product that powers AI chips made by HBM. Nvidia, google and Amazon Web services are central to the growth of artificial intelligence giants like Anthropic and OpenAI. Manufactured by three major companies. samsung, SK Hynix and micron.
Overall view of facilities related to Changxin Memory Technologies in Qingdao, Shandong Province, China, September 4, 2026.
VCG | Visual China Group | Getty Images
The same three companies control most of the DRAM market, but now CXMT has entered the picture. The company’s share of the DRAM market jumped from just 4% by revenue to 10% in just one year, from the second quarter of 2025 to the same quarter of 2026, Counterpoint found using the latest report available. In July, the company went public, and its stock price soared, making it the most valuable listed company in China at the time.
According to Counterpoint, the company’s HBM capabilities are still in the early stages, but the company plans to start producing chips despite low yields of just 20-30%, Reuters reported. This means that the majority of the chips it produces are defective.
CXMT is already on the Department of Defense’s “1260H” list, which identifies dozens of Chinese companies with ties to the Chinese military. But Chan said the list does not have strict restrictions on U.S. companies.
“This is not a very meaningful list in terms of restrictions on U.S. companies partnering with Chinese companies on this list,” Zhang said.
The Wall Street Journal reported on August 9th. apple was considering using CXMT memory in iPhones and Macs, given the global shortage due to AI augmentation. Things may change once you’re on the Entity List.
“From the U.S. government’s perspective, their concern is that working with CXMT, even if they just buy the product as a customer, could help improve their memory chip production capacity and also help China further down the path to HBM,” Zhang said. “This is part of a broader effort to hinder or slow China’s own chip development.”
In his letter, Cotton noted that CXMT is seeking to enter the HBM market.
“(CXMT’s) decision to proceed in less-than-ideal conditions highlights both Communist China’s desperation for chips and the struggles of a manufacturing industry without advanced equipment or knowledge,” he said. “More can be done to support the supply chain and ensure that CXMT is isolated from financial and technological resources that inhibit U.S. growth.”
