A Reuters exclusive, April 28/29:
- Demand for Huawei's Ascend 950 AI chips surges
- Surge in demand comes in the wake of DeepSeek V4 release
- Big tech firms including ByteDance, Tencent, Alibaba reach out about new orders
Demand for Huawei's Ascend 950 AI chips has surged following the release of DeepSeek's V4 artificial intelligence model that runs on the Shenzhen-based tech firm's chips, with major Chinese internet firms rushing to secure orders, three people familiar with the matter said.
China's biggest internet firms including ByteDance, Tencent (0700.HK), and Alibaba (9988.HK), are reaching out to Huawei about new chip orders, said the sources, who are familiar with the procurement discussions.
Companies specializing in cloud computing and graphics processing unit (GPU) rental services are also scrambling to place orders, two of the sources added, without providing the names of the firms.While the 950PR significantly outperforms Nvidia's H20 chip - the most powerful chip Nvidia was permitted to sell in China until Beijing blocked its import last year - it still trails the American firm's H200, a more advanced processor that has been caught up in regulatory limbo.Despite U.S. and Chinese approvals for exports, the H200 has yet to be shipped to China as Beijing and Washington remain at odds over the conditions governing its sale, providing an opportunity for Huawei to sell its semiconductors.The 950PR represents a breakthrough for Huawei after years of struggling to win large orders from China's tech sector. Customer testing of the chip went well earlier this year, with firms including ByteDance and Alibaba planning orders after samples were distributed in January, Reuters reported in March.Huawei, ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent did not respond to Reuters requests for comments.DEEPSEEK FRENZY
The scramble for Huawei's chips underscores how DeepSeek's V4 release last week has turbocharged demand for domestic Chinese AI hardware as U.S. export controls continue to restrict access to Nvidia's most advanced processors. It is also an endorsement of the performance of Huawei's chips so far....
....MUCH MORE
Our intro to September 2025's Chips: "Huawei lays out multi-year AI accelerator roadmap and claims it makes Earth’s mightiest clusters":
This is the one Nvidia's Jensen Huang thinks about.
If interested see also July 2025's "The Secret History of China’s Most Powerful Company"
