BIS License Delays Posing Challenges for Foreign Workers, Students, US Facility Visits

The issues were described by U.S. companies, their consultants and multiple foreign workers who recently received job or internship offers from American tech firms but who have been unable to begin work because they're waiting for approval on deemed export licenses from BIS. Those licenses allow certain people to work with controlled items, software or technology on U.S. soil if an export license would normally be required to ship the item to that person's home country.

Each worker agreed to speak on the condition of anonymity, either because they weren’t authorized by their prospective employer to discuss their work or because they feared jeopardizing their temporary status in the U.S.

One Iranian student who's studying at a California university said they were supposed to begin work in June after their employer, a major technology company, applied for a license in April. A recent Ph.D. graduate also studying in the U.S. said they were scheduled to start work in early September but were told to expect a delay of five to 10 months. A worker in the tech industry said they have been waiting for a license since December, and another person -- who had been waiting for a license since October 2024 -- said this month that a U.S. company rescinded their job offer because BIS hadn’t made progress on the license.

The Iranian student said their work involves AI and large language models. They said they applied and were accepted for a summer internship at a prominent tech firm because their school adviser had no funding for their research during the summer break. They were unable to start work on time because of BIS license delays.

“I don't have any job. I don't have any money,” the student said. “It's a hard time. It’s a very hard time for me. All of my plans are affected by this.”

One researcher said visa restrictions have already caused them to miss “several conferences and valuable opportunities to present my work.” They were hopeful about the job offer they received to work at a large U.S. technology company, but they haven’t been able to start because they don’t have a license.

“After finally finding a position that many people would consider a dream job, I am again facing another obstacle,” said the person, who asked for their home country not to be named. They said they feel they "cannot progress in my life, even though I have moved abroad.”

Trade lawyers and consultants have said that deemed export licenses have long been challenging to obtain, especially for particularly sensitive technologies involving adversarial nations. But they also said those licenses have become increasingly difficult in recent months, especially if they involve Chinese or Iranian nationals. Trump issued a memorandum in February ordering U.S. agencies to use export controls to ramp up pressure against Iran (see 2502050020).

Alfredo Fernandez, a trade lawyer who works on deemed export licenses, said obtaining them is a particular challenge in university settings. He has seen licensing "slowdowns” this year and in previous years, particularly involving Iranian and Chinese students.

“They take a long time, or they come back with a lot of heavy provisos or limits as to the deemed export license,” he said. “In a university setting, that's a semester gone, and there's only so many semesters these students are on campus.”

He also said some U.S. companies will extend job offers “on the expectation that an export license would be granted,” but license delays can place those offers in jeopardy.

“They're kind of a sitting duck for a while, and that's a strain on business,” Fernandez said, “particularly small and medium manufacturers that can't just float an employee for an administrative delay indefinitely.”

Export license application approvals have slowed to a crawl as BIS grapples with a backlog after pausing certain license reviews multiple times this year (see 2506110008, 2504020051 and 2504140055). In addition, an executive order that President Donald Trump signed in September established a $100,000 fee for every application for an H-1B visa, a program that allows U.S. employers to hire talented foreign workers in specialty occupations. That's expected to make it more challenging for foreign tech specialists to work in the U.S.

Tia Sandberg, a trade compliance consultant with Total Logistics Resource, said deemed export licenses have been particularly slow this year. She works with U.S. companies in the firearms industry that need such licenses to allow representatives from foreign suppliers to tour their American facility, she said, “and those this year have been severely delayed.” The U.S. companies have either had to cancel the visits or limit them to ensure they don’t involve any export-controlled items or information.

“Maybe they were going to give them a tour of their manufacturing, but now they just bring them into their conference room and just meet, and that's it,” Sandberg said.

So far, she said, she hasn’t seen those challenges “end the business relationship” between U.S. companies and foreign suppliers, partly because they're established, long-term business partners. “But if there's a new product that the customer is wanting to see, it hampers going forward,” Sandberg said. “A lot of those items are made in other countries, and so they can just go to another country and get it. It does hamper their ability to sell.”

She said clients have so far applied for three deemed export licenses this year, and they canceled each after seeing no progress at BIS. The applications had been sitting for three or four months, when they used to take 40 to 60 days to be adjudicated, Sandberg said. BIS didn’t provide an explanation for the slowdown.

U.S. companies are “very frustrated, especially when there are no answers,” Sandberg said. “It's one thing if there's a pause and they're getting communication, so they have something to go to their customer and let them know what's going on. But when it's just nothing, they've got nothing to give to their customer to manage their expectations, and that's difficult.”

A BIS spokesperson didn’t respond to a request for comment.