In response to U.S. export controls, Nvidia plans to launch three chips specifically tailored for the Chinese market this month. This was reported by the South China Morning Post in November last year, citing people familiar with the matter. All three chips were developed within U.S. regulation, but their computing power and functionality have been reduced in order to bypass U.S. restrictions and continue to sell to China. The American side did not intervene in this.
It is reported that the main difference between these custom chips and the original chips is the computing power, but it may also affect the performance in other aspects. U.S. companies such as Nvidia didn't want to abandon the Chinese market because of U.S. sanctions, because China is an important source of income for them. However, due to Biden's tough posture, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and others went to Washington to negotiate fruitlessly, so they could only take this kind of countermeasure. The United States initially believed that China did not have too many chip choices, and could only accept this imperfect solution until domestic chips could reach the level of high computing power, and the United States also thought that these custom chips would have a good market.
However, according to the latest news from Wall Street ** on the 7th, China's interest in these defective chips is far lower than expected. Judging from the sales data and feedback from industry insiders, although Nvidia's engineers quickly designed products that comply with the new rules, the number of orders in China is small, which can be seen as a kind of "boycott" of the United States. Nvidia is having an increasingly difficult time finding a balance between meeting U.S. regulatory requirements and providing the chips that Chinese customers need. Some of China's largest companies, such as Alibaba and Tencent, have begun to turn to domestic chip brands, and demand for chips in the United States has plummeted this year.
The United States** believes that this means that Nvidia faces the risk of losing sales in the Chinese market for a long time, which is related to geopolitical tensions. However, some analysts believe that there is another reason for China's indifference to American chips: the behavior of the United States has caused China's vigilance, fearing that Biden ** (or the next **) will further tighten the performance restrictions of chips, or even cut them off completely**. Therefore, China is more eager to localize chips, while the "customized" version of chips in the United States is less important. Although the U.S. Department of Commerce has also promised companies such as Nvidia that they will try to support them in exporting chips to China in "non-sensitive areas".
Finally, the report also mentions that China cannot completely get rid of its dependence on American chips at this time. Some respondents admit that China's domestic alternatives are still insufficient, and Nvidia's chips will remain their first choice in the coming year. However, this may change as the trend of chip localization becomes more and more obvious. One commentator pointed out: "The U.S. has already shown the essence of 'not keeping its word', for example, Chinese buyers have just adapted to this new alternative version, and the U.S. has used an executive order to stop them, so who will bear the consequences?"There are already too many games to play, and it has also made China realize how urgent the development of domestic semiconductors is. ”