Huawei’s new AI chip: contender of Nvidia’s supremacy

Huawei has sent samples of its latest Ascend 910C AI chips to some of China’s biggest AI firms, many of which have traditionally used Nvidia, according to the South China morning post. Little detail is yet available on the Ascend 910C, but the chip should represent a significant jump from the previous model and could potentially be just as powerful as Nvidia’s H100 in terms of raw computing capability.

This development comes at a time when Nvidia is facing possible further US trade restrictions that have already curtailed its capacity to carry out its business with China. Bans like this one have forced the Chinese tech industry to look elsewhere for alternatives, and Huawei was where they found one of them. Recently, a new ban prevented Nvidia from selling its H20 AI accelerators, a chip whose specialty was specifically designed for the Chinese market.

And if these trade restrictions continue to persist, Huawei’s Ascend 910C might be an even more attractive option for Chinese companies sick of the uncertainty surrounding the access to foreign AI hardware. As bright as the prospects of the AI hardware market may now look, the future is still too dimly lit to speak of certainties, but this latest chip from Huawei could pose the biggest challenge to Nvidia’s time in the spotlight if this does not change.

However, Huawei itself is not without its problems. The older Ascend 910B chip had been troublesome in terms of bottlenecks in production, such that some Chinese companies returned to Nvidia out of concerns over Huawei’s ability to meet demand. If Huawei can successfully scale up and reliably produce Ascend 910C chips, the company could further shake up the competitive landscape by providing a strong domestic alternative at a time when uncertainty around Nvidia’s long-term presence in China may create opportunities for a worthy substitute.