Nvidia Is Cooking Up a Special AI Chip for China
This tango between the US and China is getting spicier than Sichuan hotpot.
Let's agree on one thing: this US-China love-hate affair is never going to end.
If it's not China going through the back door to outsmart Washington's EV incentives, it's a U.S. tech company getting in bed with the Chinese state-controlled telecom giant to launch its streaming service in the Asian country.
Now, Nvidia is said to be cooking up a new dish for the Chinese tech market – a special version of its new, super-powered AI chip, the Blackwell, just for China, in a bid to comply with the current U.S. export controls that are designed to limit Beijing's access to advanced technologies and constrain military advances.
Per Reuters, this China-friendly chip – codenamed B20 – is being built in partnership with Inspur, a Chinese tech giant, and is expected to be powerful and smarter, making your chatbots conversationally sharper.
We don't know much for now, but it does seem that a version of a chip from Nvidia's Blackwell series for the Chinese market would boost the semiconductor giant's efforts to fend off those chip trade restrictions imposed by the U.S. government.
So, will the B20 be a game-changer for China's AI scene? Only time will tell. But one thing's for sure, this tango between the US and China is getting spicier than Sichuan hotpot.
