The Financial Times (FT) reported on the 19th, citing sources familiar with the matter, that the Chinese government has allowed a small quantity of Nvidia's advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip H200 to be brought into mainland China. As U.S.-China AI competition intensifies, the move is seen as China easing import criteria to support its domestic corporations.
According to the report, TikTok parent ByteDance Ltd. and Tencent each received about 10,000 H200 graphics processing units (GPUs). Several other Chinese tech corporations are also expected to secure a similar volume of chips soon.
The H200 is at least two generations behind Nvidia's top-performing chips. Due to U.S. export controls, Chinese corporations cannot purchase Nvidia's most advanced chips.
Initially, these corporations received approval from the U.S. government to purchase up to 100,000 H200 chips each, but sources said the Chinese government is requiring these corporations to keep most of those chips outside mainland China. The move is interpreted as a measure to support semiconductor corporations in China.
According to one source, some Nvidia partners, including Lenovo, notified Chinese customers last week that they could resume ordering products equipped with H200 chips. They integrate Nvidia chips with a Neural Processing Unit (NPU), other networking equipment, and sell them as AI servers.
Separately from the small number of H200 chips allowed into mainland China, Chinese regulators have reportedly informed corporations that they may send those H200 chips to Hong Kong and use them locally.