China

The US government's trade ban on Huawei was meant to bring the company to its knees both as punishment for its alleged cybersecurity crimes as well as a bargaining chip in trade talks with China. For the past 12 months, however, Huawei has found some ways to get around some of those restrictions to maintain its business. Over the weekend, the US Commerce Department dealt what could be the most crippling blow to the company, and, unsurprisingly, Huawei has responded with accusations that the US is attempting to strengthen its technology industry by crushing everyone else's.

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Some, especially governments, live by a "tit for tat" philosophy so it's really no surprise that China wants to hit the US back. The latter has not only extended Huawei's fate as part of the government's entity list, the US Department of Commerce has also made moves to deprive the phone maker of much-needed access to semiconductors for its processors. Since negotiations seem to have broken down, China is now threatening to respond in kind and put US companies on its own upcoming "unreliable entity list".

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Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, more commonly referred to as TSMC, has announced plans to bring another semiconductor facility to the United States. The company plans to build and operate a $12 billion factory in Arizona, where it will use its 5-nanometer technology to produce 20,000 semiconductor wafers per month. The company plans to start construction on the new facility next year.

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Animal Crossing: New Horizons has turned into quite the hit for Nintendo, and even though it isn't officially available in China, Switch owners there have found ways to play it. Chinese players have mostly obtained Animal Crossing: New Horizons either by switching their region on the eShop to buy games from other countries or by purchasing imported physical copies. Unfortunately, it seems that it just became a lot harder for those gamers to buy an imported copy of the New Horizons.

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A middle-aged man under observation for COVID-19 proved active for 49 days in an early (preprint) report from China. The signs were not severe - his immune cell indicators remained stable. It was his COVID-19 viral load that remained high for a previously unseen amount of time. NOTE: At the point at which this article was published, the original data had not been peer-reviewed - we will be keeping an eye on the original report and will update as necessary.

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Global smartphone market shipment data showed a slowing in sales by 14% in the month of February. Information from Counterpoint Research suggested that this trend isn't about to end. Counterpoint senior analyst Jean Park went so far as to say "the worst is yet to come." This has a bit to do with the prediction that this pandemic will be similar to previous world pandemic events - with a double peak, one in Q4 2020, and another in the first quarter of 2021.

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Chinese state media has announced that a subunit vaccine against the novel coronavirus has been developed and is now entering clinical trials. The approval for the tests was granted late local time on March 16 and was officially announced to the public on March 17 by China Central Television. According to the announcement, this vaccine was developed by the Academy of Military Medical Sciences.

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A newly published study reveals that so-called 'stealth' transmission of the novel coronavirus largely fueled the outbreak that impacted China. The study says that many of the COVID-19 cases in China likely didn't have severe symptoms, meaning infected people may have thought they had a simple cold and went on with their lives. This, in turn, caused the virus to rapidly spread through the Wuhan population.

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There's a global pandemic going on right now thanks an infectious disease called COVID-19, aka "the coronavirus".* COVID-19 is caused by SARS-CoV-2, aka severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. If you're reading this article while you're out about town, go home now. Now is the time when you should be isolating yourself by yourself or with your immediate family to avoid further spread.

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This week Apple sent a message to Apple Stores about the upcoming near-inevitability of supply shortages for iPhone replacements due to COVID-19. That's also known as novel coronavirus, a health issue affecting the whole world - but especially China, where much of Apple's manufacturing of hardware takes place. This could be bad news for you and good news for case-makers - those accessory creators whose aim it is to keep your iPhone safe from harm BEFORE it might need replacing.

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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released an official list of cleaning products that can be used to kill off the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19. The information is particularly useful for healthcare facilities and businesses, but it also informs the average person of what they need to use in order to disinfect their home or vehicle if either has been exposed to the virus.

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The Office of the Surgeon General recently published a tweet reading, "Seriously people -- STOP BUYING MASKS!" The agency reiterates that face masks won't help protect someone from contracting the new novel coronavirus, which has spread into multiple countries and has popped up in various places around the United States. These masks, the Surgeon General states, should be reserved for healthcare workers.

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