Nvidia is working closely with the U.S. government to ensure new chips for the Chinese market are compliant with export curbs, CEO Jensen Huang said on Wednesday. The California-based artificial intelligence Nvidia’s chip designer has commanded more than 90% share of $7 billion China’s AI chip market. But as per analysts new chip export restrictions by U.S. are likely to create opportunities for Chinese rivals to make inroads.
Nvidia’s new chips
A per report, last month Nvidia had told customers in China it was delaying the launch of a new China-focused AI chip until the first quarter of next year.
“Nvidia has been working very closely with the U.S. government to create products that comply with its regulations,” Huang told a news conference in Singapore.
“Our plan now is to continue to work with the government to come up with a new set of products that comply with the new regulations that have certain limits.”
Nvidia’s competition
He added Nvidia needs to seek the advice of the market and the process is ongoing, adding that Huawei was a “formidable” competitor.
Nvidia warned during its November earnings that it expects a steep drop in fourth-quarter sales in China in the wake of the new U.S. rules.
U.S. export restrictions for China
Huang noted that China’s revenue contribution to Nvidia has been traditionally around 20% but it was hard to predict how much that would change with the new U.S. export restrictions.
Separately, he said Nvidia was in talks with Singapore about potential big investments and working with the city-state to help develop its own large language model, Sealion.
Singapore’s Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) announced on Monday a S$70 million ($52 million) initiative to develop Southeast Asia’s first large language model.
Huang noted Singapore had a vibrant AI ecosystem and its role as a major data center for many Asian markets.
Deal with Japan
Japan’s chip policy may have notched another win, as Nvidia announced it would partner with Japanese firms to build a new network of plants in the country, focused on making graphics processors used for AI.
“Japan has all of the technical expertise, the industrial capacity to create your own artificial intelligence, right here in Japan,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said in a meeting with Japan’s economy minister Yasutoshi Nishimura on Tuesday, according to Bloomberg.
In an earlier meeting, Huang promised Prime Minister Fumio Kishida that the chipmaker would do its best to supply critical AI processors to Japan. A surge of interest in generative AI products is leading to a supply crunch for the processors used to power them.
