The United States has stated it will not supply NVIDIA’s latest AI chips to China, while China has imposed a ban on using U.S. AI chips in its domestic AI data centers.
Analysts view this as a signal that China, which has relied on NVIDIA’s GPUs, is effectively declaring a break from the U.S. and intensifying the AI dominance race.
Reuters reported on Wednesday that the Chinese government announced guidelines mandating the use of only domestically produced AI chips in new AI data centers funded by state resources.
For data centers with less than 30% completion progress, the guidelines require replacing U.S.-made AI chips with Chinese alternatives. This effectively aims to phase out U.S. AI chips from Chinese data centers.
AI chips include GPUs and AI accelerators connected to high-bandwidth memory (HBM). NVIDIA dominates over 90% of the global market.
The U.S. restricts NVIDIA to exporting only low-performance AI chips to China. The tech industry interprets this move by Chinese authorities as a display of confidence in developing high-performance AI without NVIDIA’s chips.
Some critics argue it is a retaliatory card to pressure the U.S. to ease export restrictions.
Meanwhile, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang stated at an AI event in London on the same day, “China will surpass the U.S. in the AI race.” He assessed that the current gap in AI technology between the two countries is “a mere split second,” indicating near parity.
Source: The Chosunilbo
