The National Press Foundation has named The Wall Street Journal as the winner of the 2024 Hinrich Foundation Award for Distinguished Reporting on Trade for its series on China’s phasing out of U.S. technology.
WSJ reporters Liza Lin, Raffaele Huang and Stu Woo created an exclusive series of stories revealing China’s ‘Delete America’ efforts to replace U.S. companies’ technology with domestic alternatives; the lengths the Chinese government went to for a Huawei resurgence in spite of U.S. trade restrictions; and an “underground network sneaking Nvidia chips into China.”
NPF judges were particularly impressed with the Wall Street Journal’s ability to obtain a 2022 Chinese government directive, called Document 79, which requires state-owned companies to replace U.S. and other foreign software in their IT systems by 2027.
“China is known for vigorously protecting state secrets, making the Journal’s deep and compelling reporting on this issue especially impressive,” judges said.
The reporting has been cited by both Senate and House committees examining the threat of China to U.S. interests, as well as by individual lawmakers in calls to tighten U.S. export controls.
Members of the Wall Street Journal team will accept the award at NPF’s 42nd annual awards dinner on Feb. 20, 2025.