Since 1990, the U.S. share of global semiconductor manufacturing capacity has declined while the shares of China, South Korea, and Taiwan have increased. If carefully targeted, CHIPS for America Act incentives could reverse this trend for the types of chips that matter most to U.S. national security. In this policy brief, the author assesses how CHIPS Act incentives should be distributed across different types of chips.

Devices based on superconductor electronics can achieve much higher energy efficiency than standard electronics. Research in superconductor electronics could advance a range of commercial and defense priorities, with potential applications for supercomputing, artificial intelligence, sensors, signal processing, and quantum computing. This brief identifies the countries most actively contributing to superconductor electronics research and assesses their relative competitiveness in terms of both research output and funding.

Advances in robotics technology are having a transformative effect on how people work, travel, communicate, and fight wars. This data brief provides an overview of global trends in robotics patents between 2005 and 2019, focusing in particular on the state of robotics patenting in Russia, as well as developments in military robotics patents both in Russia and across the globe.

This report examines nearly 350 artificial intelligence-related equipment contracts awarded by the People’s Liberation Army and state-owned defense enterprises in 2020 to assess how the Chinese military is adopting AI. The report identifies China’s key AI defense industry suppliers, highlights gaps in U.S. export control policies, and contextualizes the PLA’s AI investments within China’s broader strategy to compete militarily with the United States.

Congress has advanced legislation to appropriate $52 billion in funding for the CHIPS for America Act, which aims to increase semiconductor manufacturing and supply chain resilience in the United States. But more can be done to improve the resiliency of U.S. access to microelectronics beyond manufacturing incentives. This report outlines infrastructure investments and regulatory reforms that could make the United States a more attractive place to build new chipmaking capacity and ensure continued U.S. access to key inputs for semiconductor manufacturing.

Chinese and Russian government officials are keen to publicize their countries’ strategic partnership in emerging technologies, particularly artificial intelligence. This report evaluates the scope of cooperation between China and Russia as well as relative trends over time in two key metrics of AI development: research publications and investment. The findings expose gaps between aspirations and reality, bringing greater accuracy and nuance to current assessments of Sino-Russian tech cooperation.

Since 2011, China has dramatically grown its robotics sector as part of its mission to achieve technological leadership. The Chinese government has encouraged this growth through incentives and, in some cases, subsidies. Patents in robotics have surged, particularly at Chinese universities; by contrast, private companies comprise the bulk of robotics patent filers around the world. China has also seen a corresponding growth in robotics purchasing and active robotics stock. This data brief explores the trends in robotics patent families published from China as a measure of robotics advancement and finds that China is on track to emerge as a world leader in robotics.

CSET Research Analyst Will Hunt testified before the Strategic Technologies and Advanced Research (STAR) Subcommittee on "Microelectronics: Levers for Promoting Security and Innovation." He offered recommendations to advance the U.S.' semiconductor industry.

AI technologies will likely alter great power competitions in foundational ways, changing both how nations create power and their motives for wielding it against one another. This paper is a first step toward thinking more expansively about AI & national power and seeking pragmatic insights for long-term U.S. competition with authoritarian governments.

China’s National Cybersecurity Center (NCC) resides on a 40 km2 plot in Wuhan. As one indication of its significance, the Chinese Communist Party’s highest-ranking members have an oversight committee for the facility. Over the next decade, the NCC will provide the talent, innovation, and indigenization of cyber capabilities that China’s Ministry of State Security, Ministry of Public Security, and People’s Liberation Army Strategic Support Force hacking teams lack. Though still under construction, the NCC’s first class of graduates will cross the stage in June 2022.