Links for Thursday, September 10, 2020

BUSINESS AND TECHNOLOGY:

• Could TikTok be banned in the U.S. on September 20?
  ByteDance is poised to miss U.S. deadline for TikTok sale / Bloomberg (porous paywall)
  “ByteDance probably needs beyond the U.S. executive order ban on Sept. 20 to nail down an agreement with either party because of the [Chinese] regulatory review.”
  Trump team eyes giving China’s Bytedance more time to line up TikTok sale / Bloomberg via SCMP
  TikTok, U.S. discuss ways to avoid sale / WSJ (paywall)
  Earlier on The China Project: Beijing threatens to yank TikTok out of Trump’s reach.
• European firms in China anxious about tensions
  European companies fear ‘arbitrary punishment’ amid China-Europe tensions, business groups says / Reuters
• Sequoia Capital Equity Partners launched with $300 million initial capital
  Successful with Chinese startups, Sequoia China launches a hedge fund / WSJ (paywall)
• Goldman negotiates for full ownership of its Chinese venture
  Goldman Sachs to buy out partner in China securities venture / Caixin (paywall)
  Wall Street brushes off political tensions to dig deeper into China / FT (paywall)
• Indian business receives shock from loss of Chinese investment
  India start-ups flounder as tensions with China rise / BBC
  “Chinese companies have already invested in 18 of India’s 30 unicorns — technology companies with a valuation of over $1 billion.”
• Disney is pleased with Mulan, despite controversy on both sides of Pacific
  China bars media coverage of Disney’s ‘Mulan’ after Xinjiang backlash — sources / Reuters
  Disney ‘very pleased’ with ‘Mulan’ debut ahead of China opening / Reuters
• China Electronics unveils cloud services
  As Washington restricts tech, state-owned giant gets into cloud computing / Caixin (paywall)
• Car sales
  Chinese car sales rise at fastest rate in more than two years / WSJ (paywall)
  China auto sales up 6% in August, down 15.4% year-to-date / AP
  Chinese online used car seller Uxin’s second-quarter revenue nosedives on sluggish sales / Caixin
• 5G deployment
  China has reached about 96 percent of its target to build 500,000 5G base stations this year / SCMP
  Pairing up on 5G saves China Telecom and Unicom 60 billion yuan / Caixin
• Huawei’s plans for tech independence
  HarmonyOS coming to smartphones next year: Huawei / TechNode

SCIENCE, HEALTH, AND THE ENVIRONMENT:

• Lingering asymptomatic case of COVID-19 in Nanjing
  Nanjing man tests positive for coronavirus weeks after quarantine ends / Caixin
• Battling seasonal flu after COVID-19
  China to make up to 50 million flu vaccine doses available amid COVID-19 pandemic, official says / SCMP
• Vaccine diplomacy
  Brazil could launch Chinese coronavirus vaccine this year, says governor, citing ‘extremely positive’ results / AFP via SCMP

POLITICS AND CURRENT AFFAIRS:

• Foreign ministers of Russia, India, China meet in Moscow amind border standoff
  Foreign ministers of Russia, India, China meet in Moscow / Economic Times of India
  China-India border dispute: armed parachute drills by elite PLA forces point to military build-up / SCMP
  India bulks up amid provocation by China’s People’s Liberation Army / Hindustan Times
  India and Japan sign military pact as China flexes regional muscle / Nikkei Asian Review
  “India and Japan have signed a pact for the reciprocal provision of supplies and services between their armed forces.”
  India and China meet to defuse Himalayan border tensions / FT (paywall)
• People’s Daily refuses to publish U.S. ambassador’s article on “reciprocity”
  China, U.S. trade attacks after paper refuses to carry envoy’s op-ed / Reuters
  People’s Daily defends decision not to run ‘factually inaccurate’ article by American ambassador / SCMP
  The hypocrisy of the PRC’s propaganda system / U.S. Department of State
• Australia-China tensions
  Australian diplomats ‘interfered in a Chinese legal case’ by sheltering correspondents Bill Birtles and Mike Smith, China says / Australian ABC
  China’s trade dispute with Australia has not extended to iron ore…yet / Australian ABC
  Chinese professor ‘stunned’ by Australian decision to cancel his visa / Guardian
  Why the Australia-China relationship is unraveling faster than we could have imagined / The Conversation AU
  James Laurenceson, director of the Australia-China Relations Institute, says, “While the Australian government has deliberately put distance between itself and the Trump administration, Beijing remains wedded to the idea Australia is a U.S. lackey, despite significant evidence to the contrary.”
• U.S. reconnaissance tactics near Hainan Island
  U.S. spy plane impersonates Malaysian aircraft, flies near China / Popular Mechanics
• Military drills in southern Russia later this month
  China says it will join Russian military exercises this month along with Iran, Belarus and others / CBS
• Analysis of Japan-China territorial dispute
  What is China’s strategy in the Senkaku Islands? / War on the Rocks
• Japanese artist makes second illustrated book about Uyghurs
  Japanese author details experiences of female Xinjiang camp detainees through manga / Radio Free Asia
  “The book, which was originally written in Japanese and translated into English, was released in Turkish on August 30.”
  Related, on the Camp Album Project in January: Shimizu Tomomi’s Art Testimony.
• Afrobarometer shows resilient approval ratings for China
  China’s overall approval rating in Africa dips but not by much according to new survey / China-Africa Project
• Somaliland ignores Beijing’s warnings over official ties to Taiwan
  Somaliland opens new representative office in Taiwan / China-Africa Project
  Somaliland president says ties with Taiwan “bonded by shared democratic values and freedoms” / China-Africa Project

SOCIETY AND CULTURE:

• NGO fundraising
  Grassroots NGOs see lots of give, not enough take on Charity Day / Sixth Tone
  “99 Charity Day [is] a three-day online event organized by tech titan Tencent to help charity organizations fundraise.”
• Remembering the victims of COVID-19
  Taoist priest honors China’s coronavirus dead with memorial tablets / Reuters