Nvidia concedes China market to Huawei as export restrictions reshape AI chip landscape

Jensen Huang slams 'stupid' analogy comparing GPUs to nuclear weapons -- Nvidia CEO says government should allow selling GPUs to 'adversarial countries'

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang served as a guest speaker at Stanford's CS 153 Frontier Systems course and discussed the hardware that powers AI systems today. One of the topics covered in the YouTube session is his stance on granting "adversarial countries" access to Nvidia chips. It's widely known that the Nvidia chief is against export controls on AI chips, saying that it was a failure and has completely backfired. Other industry leaders do not take a similar stance, with Anthropic's head, Dario Amodei, comparing selling advanced AI chips to China to selling nuclear weapons to North Korea. Jensen did not take this comparison too kindly, saying it does not make any sense. "What I'm fundamentally against, and it makes no sense, it makes no sense in this moment, is to compare Nvidia GPUs to atomic bombs. There are a billion people with Nvidia GPUs; I advocate Nvidia GPUs to all of you, I advocate Nvidia GPUs to my family, my kids, to people I love -- but I don't advocate atomic bombs to anybody," the Nvidia CEO said. "So that analogy is stupid. And so, so if you start from there, you can't finish a thought -- if you start from believing that, you can't finish the rest of the thoughts." Jensen Huang is a firm believer that the world should use the American tech stack and that it would be detrimental to the U.S.'s advantage if it were to block a nation from accessing it. Nvidia has a global advantage in that it's the largest and most popular manufacturer of AI chips, and its technologies, like the CUDA architecture, drive the progress of most of the world's AI developers. Keeping this technology widely available to anyone would mean that most of the world's AI -- whether developed in the U.S. or built in China -- runs on American hardware. However, critics point out that this could fuel the nation's adversaries, enabling them to develop and train advanced artificial intelligence for military purposes using Nvidia chips. Jensen said that the Chinese military will avoid U.S. AI tech, much like how the Pentagon does not use Chinese systems. The company also denied providing technical assistance for DeepSeek to improve its training efficiency on models, which were later used by the People's Liberation Army (PLA). However, public documents revealed that some Chinese universities with deep ties to China's military-industrial complex acquired Super Micro servers configured with Nvidia A100 AI GPUs. Unlike nuclear missiles and atomic bombs, AI GPUs aren't strictly military systems designed for a specific mission. Artificial intelligence is a powerful tool that has applications in science, research, business, and many other industries. However, its flexibility also makes it a dual-use technology, meaning it can be used in civilian and military contexts. It is the latter application that has U.S. policymakers worried, in which the same hardware and AI models can be leveraged by armed forces for operational use, such as intelligence and threat analysis, autonomous systems, simulations, and more. This could erode the U.S.'s technological and military edge and give its adversaries a strategic advantage. Both sides of the argument have valid points -- America has the advantage as the key provider of AI technologies worldwide, and it makes sense to keep it that way. However, it also does not want its rivals to have access to advanced technologies that could accelerate their capabilities and narrow the United States' lead in defense technologies. Unfortunately, we can only tell which approach proves to be more effective years, if not decades, from today. Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News, or add us as a preferred source, to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds.

Nvidia says its forecast for $200 billion CPU market includes China

TAIPEI, May 23 (Reuters) - Nvidia (NVDA.O), opens new tab CEO Jensen Huang said on Saturday that his forecast of a $200 billion market for CPUs includes China, signalling Nvidia still sees significant long-term demand in the market amid ongoing U.S.-China technology tensions. Central processing units have taken centre stage as companies and businesses gravitate towards agentic AI - systems that perform autonomous functions - broadening demand beyond graphics processing units, or GPUs, that are used to train large models. Huang on Wednesday aimed to assure investors that the world's most valuable company can keep up its blockbuster growth ⁠with the help of a broad base of customers and that new products will help it beat the $1 trillion in sales it has forecast for its flagship AI chips. During an earnings call on Wednesday, Huang said Nvidia's new "Vera" central processors give it access to a new $200 billion market. Speaking to reporters upon arrival in Taipei on Saturday and asked if that forecast included China, he said: "I would think so." Nvidia has received licenses from the U.S. government to sell its H200 chips but has not received approval from Chinese officials who are fostering ⁠China's own chip suppliers. U.S. President Donald Trump's talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing this month produced no immediate breakthrough for Nvidia to sell H200 chips. Huang was also there as part of the U.S. delegation. Reuters reported last week that the U.S. has cleared around 10 Chinese firms to ⁠buy Nvidia's second-most powerful AI chip, the H200, but not a single delivery has been made so far. "H200 has been licensed to ship to China. It would be terrific to be able to ⁠serve that market. The Chinese market is very important. It's very large, of course," Huang said, speaking at Taipei's downtown Songshan airport. Huang is in Taipei ahead of next month's ⁠Computex trade show. He said he would also meet with TSMC (2330.TW), opens new tab while in Taiwan, the world's largest contract chipmaker which makes many of the advanced semiconductors powering the trend towards AI. Reporting by Wen-Yee Lee and Ben Blanchard Editing by Tomasz Janowski and Susan Fenton Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab * Suggested Topics: * Artificial Intelligence Ben Blanchard Thomson Reuters Ben joined Reuters as a company news reporter in Shanghai in 2003 before moving to Beijing in 2005 to cover Chinese politics and diplomacy. In 2019 Ben was appointed the Taiwan bureau chief covering everything from elections and entertainment to semiconductors.

Nvidia says its forecast for $200 billion CPU market includes China

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said on Saturday that his forecast of a $200 billion market for CPUs includes China, signaling Nvidia still sees significant long-term demand in the market amid ongoing U.S.-China technology tensions. Central processing units have taken center stage as companies and businesses gravitate towards agentic AI - systems that perform autonomous functions - broadening demand beyond graphics processing units, or GPUs, that are used to train large models. Huang on Wednesday aimed to assure investors that the world's most valuable company can keep up its blockbuster growth with the help of a broad base of customers and that new products will help it beat the $1 trillion in sales it has forecast for its flagship AI chips. During an earnings call on Wednesday, Huang said Nvidia's new "Vera" central processors give it access to a new $200 billion market. Speaking to reporters upon arrival in Taipei on Saturday and asked if that forecast included China, he said: "I would think so."

Nvidia says it has 'largely conceded' China's AI chip market to Huawei

Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang waves after a welcome ceremony for US President Donald Trump at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on May 14, 2026. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said the company has "largely conceded" China's artificial intelligence chip market to Huawei, as U.S. export restrictions continue to reshape the global AI semiconductor landscape. Huang's comments came as Nvidia reported another blockbuster quarter, with revenue surging 85% to $81.62 billion from $44.06 billion a year earlier. The company also unveiled an $80 billion share buyback program and raised its dividend. However, China remained a key flashpoint. "The demand in China is quite large," Huang told CNBC's Sara Eisen. "Huawei is very, very strong. They had a record year, they'll likely, very likely, have an extraordinary year coming up, and their local ecosystem of chip companies are doing quite well, because we've evacuated that market." "We've really largely conceded that market to them," he added. The remarks underscore how Washington's tightening restrictions on advanced AI chip exports have accelerated Beijing's push toward semiconductor self-sufficiency.

NVIDIA reports huge Q1 earnings due to AI boom despite struggles in China

NVIDIA has released its Q1 earnings for the 2027 financial year, revealing that it's profited handsomely from the current AI boom despite losing its Chinese market share. The company reported $81.6 billion in revenue during Q1, primarily attributable to heightened demand for their AI chips. This is a 20 percent increase in revenue compared to last quarter, and a massive 85 percent jump compared to the same time last year, breaking the chipmaker's records. "The buildout of AI factories -- the largest infrastructure expansion in human history -- is accelerating at extraordinary speed," NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang said in a statement released alongside Wednesday's earnings call. "Agentic AI has arrived, doing productive work, generating real value and scaling rapidly across companies and industries." NVIDIA also announced it is investing $80 billion into its stock buyback program, working to reacquire its own shares, while increasing dividends from $0.01 to $0.25 per share as well. These strong results come in spite of NVIDIA's foothold in China's large market disapperaing over the past few years. While sales to China accounted for around one fifth of NVIDIA's revenue in the 2023 financial year, this dropped to 13 percent in 2024 and has continued to decline since. Last year, Huang stated that NVIDIA had gone from dominating 95 percent of China's advanced chip market to being out of it completely, holding zero market share. Much of this drop can be attributed to U.S. government policies concerning exports to China, which have greatly impacted NVIDIA's business in the country. In 2022, the Biden administration restricted deliveries of NVIDIA's A100 and H100 chips to China due to national security concerns. The Trump administration continued to block the company's exports, preventing the company from selling its most advanced Blackwell chips to Chinese companies last year. There are still some less powerful NVIDIA chips available in China, with the U.S. government approving sales of NVIDIA's H20 AI chips to Chinese companies last July. Created specifically for the Chinese market, these H20 chips are actually H100 chips that have had their performance throttled in order to comply with U.S. restrictions. Unsurprisingly, uptake of these weakened chips was limited, with the Chinese government expressing national security concerns and discouraging use of NVIDIA's H20 chips. The Trump administration also approved sales of NVIDIA's advanced H200 chips to select Chinese customers at the beginning of the year, with the U.S. government set to collect a 25 percent fee. Sources speaking to Reuters state that approved customers include Alibaba, Tencent, and even TikTok owner ByteDance, each of which are permitted to purchase up to 75,000 chips. Despite this, there have reportedly been no deliveries of NVIDIA's chips to these approved Chinese buyers. It seems as though Chinese companies no longer have any interest in them, particularly amidst evolving restrictions and advice from both the U.S. and Chinese governments. "They chose not to [buy the H200]," said Trump, speaking to reporters last Friday after his recent visit to Beijing. Huang also attended the trip, a last-minute addition to Trump's tech CEO entourage. "They want to try and develop their own." The Chinese government further banned NVIDIA's RTX 5090D V2 gaming chip during Trump and Huang's visit. Like the H20, this chip was also developed specifically for China in compliance with U.S. export restrictions. In an interview with CNBC on Wednesday, Huang stated that NVIDIA has "largely conceded" the Chinese market to competitor Huawei. NVIDIA's CEO previously estimated that China's AI market could climb to $50 billion within the next few years, and that being unable to access it would be a "tremendous loss." "The demand in China is quite large," Huang told CNBC. "[Huawei] had a record year, they'll likely, very likely, have an extraordinary year coming up, and their local ecosystem of chip companies are doing quite well, because we've evacuated that market." Huang told Bloomberg earlier this week that he believes the Chinese market will eventually open up over time. For now, the AI boom seems to be more than enough to keep NVIDIA buoyed.

Nvidia says its forecast for $200 billion CPU market includes China - The Economic Times

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang believes China remains a crucial market for central processing units. He forecasts a 200 billion dollar market for these chips, including China. Despite US-China technology challenges, Nvidia aims to serve this large and important region. Huang is in Taipei ahead of the Computex trade show and will meet with TSMC.Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said on Saturday that his forecast of a $200 billion market for CPUs includes China, signalling Nvidia still sees significant long-term demand in the market amid ongoing U.S.-China technology tensions. Central processing units have taken centre stage as companies and businesses gravitate towards agentic AI - systems that perform autonomous functions - broadening demand ⁠beyond ⁠graphics processing units, or GPUs, that are used to train large models. Huang on Wednesday aimed to assure investors that the world's most valuable company can keep up its blockbuster growth with the help of a broad base of customers and that new products will help it beat the $1 trillion in sales it has forecast for its flagship AI chips. During an earnings call on Wednesday, Huang said ⁠Nvidia's new "Vera" central processors give it access to a new $200 billion market. Speaking to reporters upon arrival in Taipei on Saturday and asked if that ⁠forecast included China, he said: "I would think so." Nvidia has received licenses from the U.S. government to sell its H200 chips but has not received approval from Chinese officials who are fostering China's own chip suppliers. U.S. President Donald Trump's talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing this month produced no immediate breakthrough for Nvidia to sell H200 chips. Huang was also there as part of the U.S. delegation. Reuters reported last week that the U.S. has cleared around 10 Chinese firms to buy Nvidia's second-most powerful AI chip, the H200, but not a single delivery has been made so ⁠far. "H200 has been licensed to ship to China. It would be terrific to be able to serve that market. The Chinese market is very important. It's very large, of course," Huang said, speaking at Taipei's downtown Songshan airport. Huang is in Taipei ahead of next month's Computex trade show. He said he would also meet with TSMC while in Taiwan, the world's largest contract chipmaker which makes many of the advanced semiconductors powering the trend towards AI.

NVIDIA Expects Zero Revenue From China Even As Its Export-Locked H200s Are Approved For Sales

After NVIDIA's chief financial officer Collette Kress confirmed during her firm's latest earnings call that not only had NVIDIA secured US approval to sell the advanced H200 AI GPUs to China, but it was uncertain of earning any revenue from the sales, CEO Jensen Huang lamented that his firm had conceded the Chinese market to local firms. In an interview with CNBC, the executive remarked that since his firm had ceded the Chinese market, Huawei and other players were performing well and were likely to thrive. In his interview with CNBC, Huang asserted that the reason local Chinese companies were performing well was that his firm had had to abdicate the Chinese market. NVIDIA has been placed under strict US government restrictions that prevent it from selling its advanced AI GPUs to China. As part of a workaround to the sanctions, the firm has developed China-specific GPUs; however, the Chinese government has banned some of the products to prevent companies from securing import orders for them. During NVIDIA's earnings call, CFO Collette Kress briefly discussed the situation in China and remarked: While the US government has approved licenses for H200 to be shipped to China-based customers, we have yet to generate any revenue. And we are uncertain whether any imports will be allowed into the country. As a result, consistent with last quarter, we are not including any China data center compute revenue in our outlook. Talking to CNBC's Sarah Eisen, the NVIDIA CEO remarked that Huawei was very likely to "have an extraordinary year coming up." He added that the local Chinese ecosystem was "doing quite well, because we've evacuated that market." Speaking at the Milken Institute Global Conference in Los Angeles earlier this month, Huang had stated that China should not have the latest NVIDIA AI chips and added that "we are huge supporters of the United States having the first, the most and the best." The H200 chips recently cleared by the US government belong to the older generation of Hopper GPUs and are followed by the Blackwell and the Vera Rubin designs. While the Chinese domestic semiconductor ecosystem, and particularly Huawei, has seen more orders following the US ban, reports have suggested that some of the growth for the technology giant has come due to pressure from the government. Additionally, further US sanctions on advanced chip manufacturing equipment have forced Huawei and other players to make chips with older manufacturing technologies. Estimates suggest that not only are the best US AI chips roughly five times more powerful than Huawei's products, but also that even if Huawei were able to produce two million AI chips in 2026, its aggregate computing power would still sit at 4% of NVIDIA's. NVIDIA's market dynamics have also started to shift as the industry moves toward agentic AI. The push to AI agents has brought back the importance of CPUs and pushed Intel Corporation back into the limelight as CEO Lip-Bu Tan aggressively pursues a long overdue turnaround.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang calls out US push to ban AI chip exports to China, calls it "completely ridiculous

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang calls a total ban on AI chip exports to China 'ridiculous'. He believes such restrictions would push China to build its own technology, ultimately harming US leadership. Huang argues American companies should compete globally. He suggests China can still advance AI using existing resources and older chips, not just the most advanced ones. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has pushed back against growing calls in the US to fully block the export of advanced AI chips to China, calling the idea "completely ridiculous." He warned that a total ban would likely have unintended consequences, including accelerating China's push to build its own independent tech ecosystem. According to Huang, such restrictions could ultimately weaken US influence in the global AI race rather than strengthen it. The Nvidia chief also criticized the broader mindset behind the proposal, arguing that American companies should not retreat from international markets simply due to competitive pressure. ALSO READ: Salesforce planning a future without new engineers? "The idea that I regard as completely ridiculous is: why should American companies go compete in foreign countries if you are going to lose it anyway?" Huang said. He said if the same philosophy is followed in real life, why do we need to wake up when we have to eventually die. "If you guys all apply that same philosophy, why wake up in the morning? If you want me to lose, you are going to have to deal it to me." Nvidia CEO on Dwarkesh Podcast Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang reacted strongly when asked whether selling advanced AI chips to China could create national security risks for the United States. During the exchange, the interviewer cited Anthropic's Claude Mythos model as a reference point, suggesting that access to Nvidia's high-performance chips could potentially strengthen China's position in the global AI race and intensify competition with the US. ALSO READ: Imran Khan-linked 'Cyphergate' Row hits Pakistan "The premise that -- even if we competed in China, that we're going to lose that market anyways -- you're not talking to somebody who woke up a loser," Huang said indignantly. "And that loser attitude, that loser premise makes no sense to me." He was asked if giving China powerful AI chips could harm US companies and national security. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said China does not need access to the most advanced AI chips to remain competitive in the global tech race. He noted that models like Anthropic's Claude Mythos were trained using relatively "mundane" computing capacity, suggesting that cutting-edge hardware is not always essential for major AI breakthroughs. Huang also pointed out that China already has substantial computing resources, even if they are not at the same level as Nvidia's latest chips. He added that Chinese firms could still scale AI systems by using a "brute force" approach -- linking large numbers of older or less advanced chips to achieve similar outcomes. He cited Huawei's CloudMatrix system as an example of this strategy. Warning against strict export bans, Huang argued that isolating China from US technology would likely accelerate the creation of an independent tech ecosystem outside American influence. He said a fragmented world split between competing technology stacks would be a "horrible outcome" for long-term US leadership. Instead, Huang emphasized that the US should stay globally competitive by continuing international trade in AI hardware and keeping other countries aligned with Western technological standards.

Nvidia says China included in $200-billion CPU market forecast

STORY: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang signaled on Saturday, his company sees major long-term opportunities in China, despite tensions arising from the U.S.-China technological race. Huang spoke to reporters after landing in Taipei, ahead of a major trade show there. He was asked whether the world's second largest economy was part of the $200-billion market forecast he mentioned during Nvidia's earnings call on Wednesday. "I would think so. $200 billion is not today, it's someday. And it includes all the data centers, CPUs. This is a new market for us." :: Nvidia CPUs, or central processing units, are becoming more important as companies move toward agentic AI, which are systems that can perform tasks more independently. The shift is expanding demand beyond GPUs - or graphics processing units - the chips Nvidia is best known for, widely used to train large AI models. :: Archive In face of rising competition, Huang has tried to assure investors that the world's most valuable company can keep up its blockbuster growth with its broad base of customers. He has also been positive that new products will help the company beat the $1 trillion in sales it has forecast for its flagship AI chips. "'Vera' is a really exciting CPU, I'll tell you more about it next week..." :: Nvidia But Nvidia's H200 chip still faces hurdles in China. The U.S. government has granted licenses allowing the company to sell its second-most powerful chip there. But Chinese officials have not yet approved it, as Beijing works to support domestic chipmakers. "H200 has been licensed to ship to China. It would be terrific to be able to serve that market. The Chinese market is very important. It's very large, of course." :: May 14, 2026 Recent talks between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping did not produce an immediate breakthrough.

Nvidia says its forecast for $200 billion CPU market includes China

TAIPEI, May 23 (Reuters) - Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said on Saturday that his forecast of a $200 billion market for CPUs includes China, signalling Nvidia still sees significant long-term demand in the market amid ongoing U.S.-China technology tensions. Central processing units have taken centre stage as companies and businesses gravitate towards agentic AI - systems that perform autonomous functions - broadening demand beyond graphics processing units, or GPUs, that are used to train large models. Huang on Wednesday aimed to assure investors that the world's most valuable company can keep up its blockbuster growth with the help of a broad base of customers and that new products will help it beat the $1 trillion in sales it has forecast for its flagship AI chips. During an earnings call on Wednesday, Huang said Nvidia's new "Vera" central processors give it access to a new $200 billion market. Speaking to reporters upon arrival in Taipei on Saturday and asked if that forecast included China, he said: "I would think so." Nvidia has received licenses from the U.S. government to sell its H200 chips but has not received approval from Chinese officials who are ?fostering China's own chip suppliers. U.S. President Donald Trump's talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing this month produced no immediate breakthrough for Nvidia to sell H200 chips. Huang was also there as part of the U.S. delegation. Reuters reported last week that the U.S. has cleared around 10 Chinese firms to buy Nvidia's second-most powerful AI chip, the H200, but not a single delivery has been made so far. "H200 has been licensed to ship to China. It would be terrific to be able to serve that market. The Chinese market is very important. It's very large, of course," Huang said, speaking at Taipei's downtown Songshan airport. Huang is in Taipei ahead of next month's Computex trade show. He said he would also meet with TSMC while in Taiwan, the world's largest contract chipmaker which makes many of the advanced semiconductors powering the trend towards AI. (Reporting by Wen-Yee Lee and Ben BlanchardEditing by Tomasz Janowski and Susan Fenton) By Wen-Yee Lee and Ben Blanchard

From 95% to zero: Jensen Huang admits Nvidia has lost China's AI chip market to Huawei

There's something that Jensen Huang has probably been keeping close to him, and it wasn't until Wednesday when he openly mentioned it without mincing words at all. In an interview with CNBC following Nvidia's impressive earnings report, where revenues climbed 85 percent to $81.62 billion, the CEO revealed that the company has "largely conceded" the China AI chip market to Huawei. No beating around the bush. No playing it down. Conceded. Also read: Nobody can tell if this prize-winning story was written by AI: Can you? But the entire narrative behind why things got this far is important to know. Prior to the successive US export regulations that grew increasingly stricter starting from 2022, Nvidia dominated about 95 percent of the Chinese market for advanced AI accelerators. The rationale behind US policies was simple enough: starve China of premium AI technology, hinder its progress in AI, and thus retain its lead. The regulations ultimately led to the restriction of high-performing chips like the H100 and A100, even downgrading chips like the H20, before completely excluding Nvidia from China's supplier list. Also read: Why smartphone prices may keep rising in India through 2027 It did not go as planned. China did not wait and acted. When Nvidia's route became inaccessible, the path opened for Huawei. Huawei's artificial intelligence chips are expected to generate sales worth roughly $12 billion in 2026, a significant increase from $7.5 billion in 2025, courtesy of its new AI processor, Ascend 950PR, that went into mass production in March and received bulk orders from leading tech companies in China. "Huawei is very, very strong. They had a record year, they'll likely have an extraordinary year coming up, and their local ecosystem of chip companies are doing quite well, because we've evacuated that market," Huang said. But let us look closer at the last phrase, "we've evacuated." The statement makes it sound like the exit is a choice. Yes, it is one, but it is somewhat revisionist since Nvidia did not make a choice - it was pushed there and barred from the entry. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick admitted the following: despite US clearance of almost 10 companies in China, such as Alibaba and Tencent, to buy H200 chips, Beijing refused to allow them to go through by instructing domestic firms to invest only in home-grown chips. Huang told investors to "expect nothing" on China approvals, saying Nvidia had set its guidance and analyst expectations to reflect zero contribution from the market. That's not pessimism, it's just arithmetic. Huang has previously described China as a $50 billion AI chip market. Nvidia's cut of that is now exactly zero. The quarter that Huang was reporting during these comments is remarkable in any event. Nvidia announced an $80 billion share repurchase program as well as an increased dividend. Nvidia does not need China to succeed at this point in time. However, the larger strategy cannot be ignored. In less than three years, China has gone from almost 0 to somewhere between $30-$35 billion in an AI chip market domestically. An AI ecosystem - that can run without US chips - has already begun taking shape.