U.S. multinational technology and consulting firm IBM Corp. will allow the Chinese government access to its software codes, in a move to unlock the billion-dollar government procurement market, a senior executive said on Thursday, Oct.15, becoming the first overseas major tech company to publicly announce such a move.
Steve Mills, senior vice president of IBM software and systems unit, said that IBM has agreed to allow the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and its institutes to examine IBM products in a "cleanroom" to ensure that they comply with national information security policies.
Mills said that the company's growth in China needs government sponsorship as he called the plan "the ability to address 'secure and controllable' China initiative." But he did not give details if all the products they will sell in China will be submitted to examination.
Charlie Dai, principal analyst at Forrester Research Inc., said that the move showed IBM's collaborative effort to work with the Chinese government and help in the digital transformation of Chinese companies.
"It also shows that IBM is under pressure to sustain its business growth in China, addressing the security concerns of Chinese government and ecosystem expansion are two critical steps," Dai said.
Since former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden unveiled massive surveillance schemes carried out by the U.S. government, China has been on the lookout for information security threats, according to the report.
The report added that information technology products bought by government bodies and state-owned enterprises are all under the category of government procurement sector. Industry regulators are inspecting the items for possible security weaknesses.