US bans Nvidia AI chip exports to China

China has denounced a US move to end its access to high-end processors made by chip maker Nvidia, after Washington stepped up efforts to restrict exports of high-tech to its commercial and military rival.

The company said in a statement on Wednesday that US officials have asked Nvidia to stop selling two of its chips designed to work in the field of artificial intelligence to Chinese companies. The government imposes a licensing requirement on any products containing its upcoming A100 integrated circuits and upcoming H100 integrated circuits used in machine learning processes that augment AI systems.

The order takes effect immediately for chips destined for China and Russia, and extends to any future products that can match the performance of the A100.

The move marks the latest launch by the United States to restrict technology exports to China over concerns that it could be used for military purposes. Washington imposed restrictions on the export of technology to a number of Chinese companies and aimed to push the country to achieve self-sufficiency in Semiconductors.

Chinese Foreign Ministry official Wang Wenbin said Thursday that the United States is trying to impose a “technological blockade” on China. He said the ban showed the US was trying to maintain its “technological dominance”.

nvidia He said Washington indicated that the new licensing clause would address the risks of the products being used or diverted to military users in China and Russia. She added that she did not sell to customers in Russia. The company’s shares fell 5.7 percent in early New York trading.

Representative of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce Xu Jueting said the move undermined the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies and the stability of global industry and supply chains.

Nvidia said in deposit It was “dealing with customers in China” and “seeking to meet their planned or future purchases of data center products with products not subject to new licensing requirements”.

Analysts at investment bank Jefferies said that the largest users of chips in China are cloud service providers and large Internet companies. They said there are no direct local alternatives, and one alternative would be to use multiple Nvidia low-end processors that weren’t blocked. They added that this attempt to replicate the processing power would not achieve the same speeds and come at a much higher cost.

Nvidia said about $400 million in potential sales to China this quarter could be affected by the new licensing requirements.

Shares of the chip maker fell 6 percent in premarket trading on Thursday on the news that also weighed on shares of other semiconductor companies. Nvidia competitor Advanced Micro Devices told Reuters news agency it had received new licensing requirements that would prevent the export of MI250 AI chips to China.