AI Chips

NVIDIA’s H20 series AI chips have U.S. approval for reintroduction to China alongside a new RTX Pro GPU for the Chinese market. Morgan Stanley sees this as a positive catalyst for BAT, anticipating increased capital expenditure for AI, cloud services, and e-commerce enhancements. Chinese firms like Tencent and ByteDance are placing orders, requiring U.S. government approval. The move aims to counter Huawei’s dominance in the Chinese market by providing an alternative, potentially limiting Huawei’s global competitiveness despite its technological advancements.

Malaysia is implementing a licensing regime for U.S.-made high-performance AI chip exports and transshipments to prevent diversion, especially to China. Effective immediately, entities suspecting misuse must notify authorities 30 days prior to export and obtain permits. This addresses regulatory loopholes, with plans to add AI chips to the Strategic Items List. This follows U.S. efforts to tighten export controls on advanced NVIDIA GPUs to Malaysia and Thailand, requiring licenses to prevent re-export to China.

Analysts boosted AMD’s stock to ‘buy’ with a $200 target, citing its MI350 AI chips as a strong Nvidia competitor. Increased optimism centers on the MI350’s performance rivaling Nvidia’s Blackwell and higher-than-expected pricing, with the MI355 model now projected to sell for $25,000. HSBC significantly raised AMD’s projected 2026 AI chip revenue to $15.1 billion (up from $9.6B). The positive outlook drove AMD’s stock up 4.15% recently.

Huawei is expanding into the global AI chip market, targeting the Middle East (UAE, Saudi Arabia) and Southeast Asia (Thailand) with its Ascend 910B chip, challenging NVIDIA. To attract clients, it’s promoting its CloudMatrix 384 super AI server, powered by the Ascend 910C chip. This server integrates 384 Ascend NPUs and 192 Kunpeng CPUs, offering high throughput (2,300 tokens/sec) and massive scalability (up to 160,000 cards). It supports stable, resilient operation. While highlighting its AI cloud services as ideal for large models, Huawei is not exporting the Ascend 910C overseas due to supply constraints, prioritizing Chinese firms impacted by US restrictions. (98 words)

AMD CEO Lisa Su is challenging NVIDIA’s dominance in the booming AI chip market. AMD’s new MI355 chips reportedly outperform NVIDIA’s offerings in AI software execution and offer a price advantage. Su forecasts the AI chip market will exceed $500 billion. OpenAI will utilize AMD’s chips, and the company aims to significantly expand its market share, though NVIDIA currently leads with substantial revenue. The MI series is pivotal for AMD’s growth.

TSMC CEO C.C. Wei, addressing a shareholder meeting, acknowledged the indirect impact of US tariffs. While recognizing potential price and demand fluctuations, Wei remained optimistic about the semiconductor industry, particularly AI chips. He highlighted strong, consistently unmet demand for AI processors and confidently forecast a “very good” outlook for TSMC over the next decade.

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang criticized U.S. AI chip export controls to China as a “failed strategy,” arguing they have spurred China’s semiconductor self-reliance while harming American firms. Speaking at COMPUTEX 2025, Huang noted Nvidia’s China market share dropped from 95% to 50% as local competitors emerged, with potential losses up to $15 billion from H20 chip restrictions. He warned Biden-era bans unintentionally accelerated China’s domestic R&D, with over half of global AI researchers now based there. The 2022 U.S. chipmaking equipment export ban drew backlash, with China condemning “unilateral bullying” harming global supply chains. Trump’s revocation of the “Intelligence Diffusion Rule” highlighted shifting market dynamics, underscoring policies that hinder innovation risk U.S. competitiveness.

The U.S. Congress introduced the bipartisan Chip Security Act this week, requiring advanced GPUs and AI chips exported to certain countries to include geolocation tracking tech. Exporters must report unauthorized diversions to China or other restricted destinations, threatening sanctions. The bill mandates enforcement standards within six months but lacks technical specifics, raising concerns over compliance costs and data privacy. As Chinese firms spend $12B annually on indirect chip purchases, critics warn the legislation may disrupt innovation and semiconductor trade dynamics while overstating control over global tech flows. (99 words)