Nvidia CEO: If U.S. ban remains, Chinese companies will buy more Huawei AI chips

Nvidia CEO: If U.S. ban remains, Chinese companies will buy more Huawei AI chips

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has expressed his concerns about the U.S. ban on the company's H20 AI chip, which was implemented by the Trump administration. Huang, in an interview with tech site Stratechery following his keynote at the Computex 2025 trade show in Taipei, described the ban as "deeply painful" [1]. The ban has forced Nvidia to write off around US$5.5 billion in inventory and forgo potential sales of US$15 billion to China's US$50 billion market. Huang believes that the ban will not effectively cut off China's ability to do AI and will instead drive Chinese companies to seek alternative solutions, such as Huawei's HiSilicon chips.

The U.S. ban on the H20 chip comes at a time when Huawei's HiSilicon chip design unit is experiencing significant growth. According to Counterpoint Research, HiSilicon's revenue doubled last year, largely due to the telecoms equipment giant's comeback in the high-end smartphone market [2]. HiSilicon's market share in the global premium Android smartphone system-on-chip market grew from 8% in 2023 to 12% in 2024. This growth is a reflection of Huawei's continued progress despite intense scrutiny from Washington.

Huang's comments suggest that the U.S. ban on the H20 chip could inadvertently boost Huawei's market share in AI chipsets. As Nvidia faces restrictions on its most advanced chips, Chinese companies may turn to Huawei's HiSilicon chips as an alternative. This shift could have significant implications for the global AI ecosystem and the tech rivalry between the U.S. and China.

References:

[1] https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3311092/nvidia-ceo-jensen-huang-calls-us-ban-h20-ai-chip-deeply-painful
[2] https://www.scmp.com/tech/big-tech/article/3310627/huaweis-chip-unit-doubled-revenue-last-year-firm-gains-china-smartphone-market-share