China bans Nvidia AI chips
China has banned the nation’s most prominent technology companies from purchasing Nvidia's artificial intelligence (AI) chips as China battles to compete with the US.
China’s internet regulator has officially banned big tech companies from buying Nvidia AI chips as Beijing, the country's capital, ramps up efforts to compete with the US chip market.
The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) reportedly instructed companies like TikTok parent company ByteDance and AliExpress’s company Alibaba to stop buying AI chips from the US company Nvidia.
ByteDance, Alibaba, and other big names in the Chinese tech industry were told to stop testing and ordering Nvidia’s RTX Pro 6000D chips, according to the Financial Times.
Multiple Chinese big tech companies suggested that they previously ordered tens of thousands of Nvidia’s signature chips and had already begun testing and verifying them alongside Nvidia’s suppliers, people familiar with the matter said to journalists.
However, when the CAC announced the nationwide ban on Nvidia chips, the companies ceased cooperation with their suppliers and stopped testing the tech.
As artificial intelligence becomes an integral part of everyday life for individuals and industries, China is consistently working to outpace the US in the AI race.
The total ban on Nvidia chips is just another way of China attempting to boost its domestic semiconductor market and compete with the US for the best and most advanced AI technology.
By pressurizing big tech companies like ByteDance and Alibaba, whose products are used worldwide, China hopes to get one over on the US.
This shift from international to domestic chips follows China’s assertion that its own chips are as good as Nvidia’s, at least the ones currently used in the country, the Financial Times reports.
Just days before the media reported China’s ban on Nvidia chips, China’s market regulator said that the US-based semiconductor company violated the country's anti-monopoly law.
The AI race has no clear-cut winner, and China is fighting back
Former President Joe Biden previously banned the export of some of Nvidia’s most powerful chips to hinder China’s AI growth and essentially slow its progress.
Yet Nvidia’s RTX Pro 6000D was manufactured specifically by the US company to be sold in China en masse.
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However, as Cybernews previously reported, the US does not have a clear lead in the race to develop AI technology.
While the US was ahead of chip design, China had more manpower, trained professionals, the minerals to create chips, and people who were willing to adopt the new technology.
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