# China's AI Export Draft: DeepSeek and MiniMax Cleared for Overseas Use, a State-Media Account Says, Under Rules Covering 23 Technologies

Times of AI Desk · 2026-10-20 · Policy

[https://timesof.ai/2026/10/china-mofcom-draft-export-controls-23-ai-technologies](https://timesof.ai/2026/10/china-mofcom-draft-export-controls-23-ai-technologies)

> Yuyuan Tantian, a social media account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV, says DeepSeek and MiniMax have completed registration and been cleared for open-sourcing and authorized overseas use under China's draft AI export controls, Reuters and PANews report; neither company immediately replied to Reuters. The draft, published Oct. 16 by the commerce and science ministries, adds 23 AI technologies to the export-control catalogue and excludes technology already public through open source or papers. Threshold details come from Bloomberg; we did not read the annex.

**Updated October 24, 2026:** A state-media-affiliated account says DeepSeek and MiniMax have completed registration under the draft rules and been cleared for overseas use. The new section directly below covers this; the original October 20 report follows, unchanged except that its headings now sit one level lower under a dated section.

## October 24: DeepSeek and MiniMax cleared for overseas use, a CCTV-linked account says

The first concrete sign of how China's draft controls will work in practice points toward permission rather than restriction for two major open-model developers, though it comes from a state-media-affiliated account rather than the ministries. **Reuters** reported that **DeepSeek** and **MiniMax** "have won state approval for global use of their AI models," citing a post on Thursday, October 22, by **Yuyuan Tantian**, a social media account affiliated with state broadcaster CCTV. DeepSeek and MiniMax did not immediately reply to Reuters' requests for comment.

**PANews**, in an English rendering of the Yuyuan Tantian article, quotes it as saying that since the policy was announced the two companies "have smoothly completed registration procedures and finished open-sourcing and overseas authorized use." The account also argued that the commerce ministry's explanation of "what is not regulated" is longer and more specific than its explanation of "what is to be regulated," and that the catalogue's core purpose is "to delineate boundaries, rather than simply restricting the export of AI technology."

Reuters reported that in a separate post on Friday, Yuyuan Tantian said overseas internet users had urged other Chinese open-source models to follow suit. It also noted that the commerce ministry said on October 16 that most AI technologies would remain exportable, with simplified licensing for open-source technology exports and for Chinese companies running their own computing centres overseas.

### Limits of the October 24 update

- The approval claim comes from Yuyuan Tantian as reported by Reuters and PANews, not from the commerce or science ministry. We did not find a ministry notice naming DeepSeek or MiniMax.
- We did not open the original Chinese post. PANews' wording is its English translation, which we quote as published; Reuters' account is a short summary.
- The draft's temporary pre-export registration, described in the original report below, may be what the account calls registration. Neither source says whether a licence was issued or which models it covers.

## Original report: China drafts export controls on 23 AI technologies, October 20

Beijing is proposing a licensing lever over unpublished frontier weights, offshore deployments and foreign takeovers of Chinese AI firms — not a ban on already-public open weights. China's **Ministry of Commerce** and **Ministry of Science and Technology** on **Friday, October 16** published Announcement 2026 No. 48, a draft revision of the Catalogue of Technologies Prohibited or Restricted from Export.

### What the MOFCOM text says

The draft adds **40** technologies across AI, biomedicine and photovoltaics. The AI section covers **23** items spanning large models, agents, computing clusters and information processing. "**Technology that has already entered the public domain through open source or published academic papers is not brought within the scope of the management,**" the announcement says, in our translation. Public comments run from October 16 to November 15.

From the publication date, a temporary **pre-export registration** applies until the catalogue is formally revised. Covered transfers include transferring ownership abroad, licensing technology for use abroad, and changing the owner or controller of a domestic technology to a foreign entity.

### Thresholds as Bloomberg reads them

**The Straits Times** republished a **Bloomberg** story saying restricted items would include model weights and source code above set performance thresholds: models with at least **2 trillion** parameters trained on "important data" (Bloomberg names Moonshot's Kimi K3 and Alibaba's Qwen3.8-Max) or ranked in the global top 10, and AI chip design at **14nm** or below or with 2.5D/3D packaging. Overseas deployment of a covered model would count as an export, with automatic licensing when it runs on the Chinese provider's own overseas infrastructure; foreign users' access through apps, websites or APIs would not be controlled, Bloomberg reported.

### The Decoder's reading

**The Decoder** headlined that China plans to tighten export controls **"on open-weight models"** and 23 AI technologies. That framing overstates the draft we read: the MOFCOM text excludes technology already public through open source or papers, and The Decoder's own body also says already-public technology is exempt and that publishing restricted weights as open source can qualify for automatic licensing. We attribute the "on open-weight models" reading to The Decoder's headline, not to the draft.

### Limits

- This is a consultation draft. Threshold figures (2 trillion parameters, top-10, 14nm, overseas-deployment and API carve-outs) come from Bloomberg via The Straits Times. **We did not read the annex** that lists the specific technology ranges.
- FLOPs and accelerator counts circulating online were not verified in any source we opened and are omitted.

## Sources

- [Reuters via Investing.com: China's DeepSeek, MiniMax win approval for AI global use, state media-affiliated entity says (October 23, 2026)](https://www.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/chinas-deepseekminimax-win-approval-for-ai-global-use-state-mediaaffiliated-entity-says-4968133)
- [PANews (English translation of a Yuyuan Tantian article): DeepSeek and MiniMax Have Completed Registration Procedures and Finished Open-Sourcing and Overseas Authorized Use (October 22, 2026)](https://www.panews.io/articles/01a16451-a3ae-72f1-985e-c32bbeb9ecd7)
- [Ministry of Commerce Announcement 2026 No. 48 (October 16, 2026)](https://www.mofcom.gov.cn/zcfb/dwmygl/art/2026/art_61446ab4beee4f63973d4d0ab3097648.html)
- [The Straits Times (Bloomberg): China plans AI export curbs to exert control over key tech (October 16, 2026)](https://www.straitstimes.com/business/china-plans-ai-export-curbs-to-exert-control-over-key-tech)
- [The Decoder: China plans to tighten export controls on open-weight models and 23 key AI technologies (October 16, 2026)](https://the-decoder.com/china-tightens-export-controls-on-open-weight-models-and-23-key-ai-technologies/)