Huawei's AI chips reach new milestone as Chinese companies seek Nvidia alternatives

Huawei has offered samples of its Ascend 910C processor to major Chinese server companies for hardware testing and configuration, according to two sources briefed on the matter. The chip, an upgraded version of the 910B, is being offered to major Chinese internet companies, which are also major Nvidia customers, according to one of the sources, a Huawei AI chip distributor.

Huawei did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

Huawei has been scrambling to fill the void left by Nvidia after Washington barred the California-based chip designer from shipping its most sophisticated graphics processing units (GPUs) to China. The Ascend 910B chips, which Huawei called on par with Nvidia’s popular A100 chipshave become a best alternative in several sectors across the country. Its Ascend solutions were used to train about half of more than 70 of China’s largest language models last year, according to Huawei.

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Huawei’s Mate XT trifold smartphone sparks frenzy, drives sky-high resale prices

The Chinese tech giant has been closely monitoring its chip progress, but it’s clear that Huawei is building a support system for the domestic AI industry. Huawei Rotating Chairman Eric Xu Zhijun said a week ago that Huawei has created two IT businesses in the past five years to create another option that can meet enterprise AI infrastructure needs .