NVIDIA says it can resume selling key AI chips to China

NVIDIA will be able to start selling its H20 AI GPU to China again soon after gaining approval to do so from the US government, the company announced in a blog post. Earlier this year, the company was blocked from selling the H20 to China over concerns it could aid the nation's military. 

"NVIDIA is filing applications to sell the H20 GPU again. The US government has assured NVIDIA that licenses will be granted and NVIDIA hopes to start deliveries soon," the article states. The company also announced the NVIDIA RTX Pro GPU that's "fully compliant" for the Chinese market, designed for smart factories and logistics. 

The US government starting blocking sales of NVIDIA's most powerful AI graphics processors, like the A100 and H200, to China back in 2022. The company subsequently developed the A800 and H800 chips for the Chinese market, but those were subsequently banned as well by the Biden administration back in 2023. NVIDIA then came up with the HGX H20 and two other chips that conformed to export rules. 

Sales of that chip were blocked too in April, but the US department of commerce has apparently reversed course again. That could be a tremendous help for NVIDIA financially as it's currently holding $8 billion in unshipped orders and expects up to $5 billion in additional revenue for 2025, Bloomberg reported. 

Yesterday, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang dismissed concerns that China's military would use the company's chips to develop AI. "They don't need NVIDIA's chips, certainly, or American tech stacks in order to build their military," he said, adding that it would be foolish of them to do so because "they simply can't rely on it." Huang has previously said that NVIDIA export bans didn't stop China from developing AI and allowed its competitors, especially Huawei, to gain ground on US technology. 

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