Silicon Valley firms won’t ship some kit to Russia
MOSCOW: Two Silicon Valley firms have stopped shipping some electronic components to Russian customers even though they are not on the list of firms subject to US sanctions, according to sources who work in the sector and a document seen by Reuters. Although Russian companies can find other suppliers, the fact that the US firms turned away Russian business demonstrates the chilling effect that a fresh wave of sanctions on Russia adopted in the past 18 months is having on the Us-russian technology trade.
That sector is especially vulnerable to the effect of sanctions because some of the components are “dual use” — they could in theory be used in weapons systems — an area now under especially tough scrutiny in Washington.
San Jose, California-based Broadcom has told Bulat, a Russian maker of telecoms equipment, that it would not supply it with printed circuit boards with microprocessors, an official at the Russian trade ministry said. Broadcom and the distributor, EBV Elektronik, did not respond to requests for comment. Bulat and the trade ministry declined to comment.
San Jose-based Xilinx, a maker of devices used to build digital circuits, has introduced an export restriction on some of its products going to Russia, said Renat Yusupov, Vice President of Kraftway, a Russian company that develops telecoms hardware using imported components. Two executives at two other Russian companies that import electronic components confirmed that Xilinx had stopped shipping some of its products.