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by thetricia 2742 days ago
So correct me if I'm wrong, but the most sinister part of the story in how some might assume SuperMicro is a Chinese or a MainlandChinese-founded company. It came right around the time ZTE, Huawei and others were facing renewed scrutiny. So you can imagine how easy it is to read the story and just think "oh, another Chinese company got busted".
2 comments
dijit 2742 days ago
It's also easy to read this as a smear campaign against Chinese companies.
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thetricia 2742 days ago
Well the big difference is it's reasonable to assume a Mainland Chinese company could get banned or sanctioned in some manner.

Now just to be fair, from what I read, there was a lot of Super Micro drama going on beforehand which likely magnified the pessimism.

Btw if you search for 'supermicro "is a chinese"' you will find some people that do think that.

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jessaustin 2742 days ago
Arresting CFOs seems to be the more popular technique now...

[EDIT:] this is a real thing that happened recently https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/12/canada-arrests-cfo-ch...

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Spooky23 2742 days ago
Which makes the idea that a US intelligence agency is setting up Supermicro really dumb on its face. The reality is that the company is poorly run and has a lot of resources and background in Taiwan.

If there’s a nefarious nation-state plot, it’s more likely a Chinese one intended to demonstrate their ability to disrupt commerce. Any of the big vendors (HP[E], Lenovo, Dell, etc) are toast without their offshore partners.

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