Investing.com – China’s leading internet firms, including ByteDance, Alibaba (HK:9988), and Tencent (HK:0700), stockpiled billions of dollars worth of Nvidia’s (NASDAQ: NVDA) H20 AI chips ahead of impending U.S. export restrictions, Nikkei Asia reported Wednesday, citing sources.
According to Nikkei, the three firms reportedly secured around one million H20 chips—enough for nearly a year’s supply—in anticipation of U.S. export restrictions starting in April.
These chips are crucial for AI applications that comply with U.S. export rules, especially for inference tasks.
Built to comply with U.S. export rules, the H20 chips are essential for AI workloads, especially inference tasks.
ByteDance, one of the most aggressive buyers and other firms placed urgent orders exceeding $12 billion. The report said several billion dollars worth of chips were shipped before the new restrictions took effect earlier this month.
The H20 is a scaled-down version of Nvidia’s H100 chip, favoured in China for its lower power consumption than the original.
Earlier this month, Nvidia announced it expects a $5.5 billion revenue hit in the first quarter due to the new export restrictions.
According to Nikkei, with the new restrictions in place, Chinese firms are turning to alternatives like Huawei’s Ascend chips and exploring workarounds such as establishing overseas subsidiaries.
Chip stockpiling comes amid soaring demand for AI computing power in China, driven by the growth of applications like DeepSeek, which are now integrated into Tencent’s WeChat.
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