President Donald Trump will travel to Beijing this week for a two-day summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, accompanied by a delegation of top US officials from the technology, finance and manufacturing sectors. The meetings, which begin on May 13, come at a critical time in US-China relations, where tensions include trade, AI, semiconductor exports, Taiwan, fentanyl smuggling and the economic fallout from the Iran war.
The White House has invited 16 business leaders to join the trip, including Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, Apple’s Tim Cook and BlackRock’s Larry Fink, among others. Trump is expected to meet with Xi later this week as both sides try to stabilize economic and diplomatic ties between the world’s two largest economies.
The panel highlights the growing role American companies are playing in US-China negotiations, especially as companies face supply disruptions and market access restrictions. Musk is expected to attend as Tesla seeks Chinese approval for its full self-driving technology, while Boeing is reportedly eyeing a large order for the plane from Chinese buyers.
Trump last visited China in November 2017, before starting a trade war that reshaped relations between Washington and Beijing. That trip focused on the trade deficit, manufacturing and investment agreements, and included executives from companies such as Goldman Sachs, Qualcomm and Boeing. This visit comes in the context of a very complicated country, where China is less dependent on US trade and disputes over AI, advanced semiconductors and national security are now at the core of the negotiations.
It is reported that Trump wants to discuss the creation of an “investment board” and a “trade board” with China, with other members of the business team possibly working on that body.
Among the semiconductor executives expected to attend are Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon and Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang he was notably uninvited. Nvidia is waiting for approval from both US and Chinese regulators to start shipping an early version of its H200 AI chip to China. The US has maintained strict restrictions on the export of advanced chips to China, arguing that the technology could support Chinese military and surveillance capabilities.
Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins he was also invited to join the team but later declined because the trip conflicted with Cisco’s quarterly earnings release scheduled for May 13.
CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman he was not included in the delegation. Altman is expected to appear in a California court this week in connection with Musk’s lawsuit against him and OpenAI.
Musk’s inclusion is also politically significant. The Tesla chief had a major falling out with Trump after he left the administration last year, but his participation in the trip shows that the two have largely mended their relationship in recent months.
16 officials are set to join Trump in Beijing
- Tim Cook, CEO of an apple
- Larry Fink, CEO and founder of BlackRock
- Stephen Schwarzman, CEO and founder of Blackstone
- Kelly Ortberg, president and CEO of Boeing
- Brian Sikes, chairman and CEO of Cargill
- Jane Fraser, chairman and CEO of Citi
- Jim Anderson, CEO of Coherent
- Larry Culp, CEO of GE Aerospace
- David Solomon, chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs
- Jacob Thaysen, CEO and chief commercial officer of Illumina
- Michael Miebach, CEO of Mastercard
- Dina Powell McCormick, president and vice chairman of the Meta
- Sanjay Mehrotra, chairman, president and CEO of Micron
- Cristiano Amon, CEO and president of Qualcomm
- Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX
- Ryan McInerney, CEO of Visa
