Good morning. Beijing is advancing its technological ambitions by pulling foreign innovation inward and exporting its own systems of digital control abroad. That’s in focus today, along with a look at Canada’s race to find new (trade) friends.

Mining: Vancouver’s Teck Resources Ltd. and London’s Anglo American PLC have agreed to merge in a US$50-billion deal that will create world’s fifth-largest copper producer.

Telecoms: MDA Space Ltd. has lost a $1.8-billion satellite contract with U.S. telecommunications company EchoStar Corp., after a “sudden change” to EchoStar’s business strategy and a U.S. regulatory spat involving Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

Energy: The bidding war to buy the last of Canada’s pure-play oil sands producers has advanced, with Strathcona Resources Ltd. launching an amended hostile bid for MEG Energy Corp. as it seeks to best a friendly $7-billion deal with Cenovus Energy Inc.

Media: The Murdoch family has reached a deal that will see Rupert Murdoch’s politically conservative eldest son Lachlan Murdoch cement control of the family media empire, which includes Fox News and the Wall Street Journal.

• Market watchers are fixated on Thursday’s U.S. inflation report. A rate cut next week by the Federal Reserve is priced in, but if inflation runs high, it could limit how quickly or how far the Fed lowers rates in the months ahead.
• We’re following a new report today in the U.S. that will reveal whether small business owners’ optimism in July has held through a rough patch marked by mounting uncertainty and hiring challenges.
• Earnings today include cloud-computing giant Oracle Corp. Investors’ fragile romance with artificial intelligence appeared to be strengthening after recent upbeat results from Nvidia Corp. and Broadcom Inc.

The lure of global competitions organized last year by Chinese officials was conventional enough: cash prizes, subsidies, and the promise of a foothold in the Chinese market. Presenters were told their pitches had to match their industrial priorities – semiconductors, biomedicine, new energy, and advanced manufacturing among them.

That same summer in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, Chinese technologists gathered to discuss how to stop internet users from slipping past the Great Firewall, the state’s vast mechanism for filtering websites, blocking apps, and monitoring online activity. Their notes described a “long-term struggle and technical confrontation” – a regional effort framed as part of China’s national security mission.

The pitch events in Canada, the U.S., and other Western countries, intelligence officials now warn, exposed entrepreneurs to the loss of intellectual property and personal data under the guise of investment. The meetings in Urumqi, meanwhile, formed part of a wider campaign to refine censorship tools and extend them beyond China’s borders, with leaked documents showing how a Beijing company, Geedge Networks, has exported Great Firewall-style systems to governments in Asia and Africa.

Taken together, the competitions abroad and the censorship projects at home reveal how Beijing is advancing its technological ambitions – pulling foreign innovation into its orbit while exporting systems of digital control to the wider world.

The welcome

Canada’s Security Intelligence Service, working with U.S. counterparts, has urged startups to approach Chinese-linked pitch competitions with caution. The events, held in cities across North America and Europe, require participants to submit detailed business plans, technical designs, and financial data.

Winners were often pressed to establish operations in China, where laws grant authorities expansive powers to access company information. The security bulletin describes the competitions as part of a systematic effort to acquire emerging technologies, particularly in artificial intelligence. By mid-2024, China had more than 250 AI data centres planned or under construction, many connected to institutions tied to the People’s Liberation Army.

• CSIS cautions tech startups about pitching at events organized by China

The squeeze

Documents reviewed by The Globe and international partners detail how Geedge Networks has become a key exporter of censorship and surveillance technology. Its Tiangou Secure Gateway, deployed in Kazakhstan, Ethiopia, Myanmar, and Pakistan, filters and monitors internet traffic, throttles access, identifies users, and blocks VPNs.

In Pakistan, Geedge stepped in after Waterloo-based Sandvine withdrew under U.S. sanctions, repurposing its hardware to help run the national firewall. In Myanmar, Geedge technology underpinned the junta’s post-coup ban on VPNs, sharply limiting access to independent information. Analysts say the company has given authoritarian governments censorship capabilities they previously lacked.

More than 100,000 internal files reviewed by The Globe and its partners offer a key insight into how Geedge exports cutting-edge censorship technology to its authoritarian clients, Asia correspondent James Griffiths writes – giving them capabilities they might not otherwise have.

• Leaked files show how a Chinese company exports the Great Firewall to the world

The push and pull

The developments align with China’s Digital Silk Road, a component of the Belt and Road Initiati