What just happened? Netgear has become the first retail consumer router company to avoid the FCC's ban on new foreign-made consumer routers, giving it a way to keep selling future products in the US even though they are built overseas.
In an April 14 update to the FCC Covered List, the agency said the Department of War had granted conditional approval for Netgear's Nighthawk and Orbi router lines, as well as its CAX cable gateways and CM cable modems, through October 1, 2027. Netgear highlighted the decision in an SEC filing the same day.
As we noted when the ban was announced last month, the FCC's order effectively blocked authorization of almost all future consumer routers made abroad.
The agency said foreign-produced routers create supply-chain vulnerabilities and severe cybersecurity risks, and pointed to their role in the Volt, Flax, and Salt Typhoon campaigns as justification for adding them to the Covered List. Previously approved models already on store shelves, or already in homes, were left untouched.
Netgear's exemption does not mean the router ban is suddenly gone. It just means regulators have decided this specific class of Netgear products does not pose the same national security risk – at least for now.
The FCC's notice also carved out Adtran's service delivery gateway routers, so Netgear is best described as the first retail consumer router brand to get through the new process, not the only company to benefit from it.
What makes the decision odd is the FCC's own guidance for conditional approvals. Applicants are supposed to disclose ownership, supply-chain exposure, firmware origins, single points of failure, and a detailed, time-bound plan to establish or expand manufacturing in the United States. They must also identify planned capital expenditures and provide quarterly onshoring updates.
Strangely, neither the FCC's brief announcement nor Netgear's filing explained what the company submitted to satisfy those requirements.
There's also the question of where Netgear builds its hardware. The company's website still lists Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand as manufacturing locations, despite the FCC process calling for a plan to shift at least some production to the US. Netgear also did not publicly explain that point when asked by reporters.
Ultimately, this wasn't a case of Netgear already making routers in America and simply getting rewarded for it. It was an exception granted to a company that still relies on the same global manufacturing footprint the ban was supposed to push out of the market.