According to a senior congressional committee staff source, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang spoke with U.S. lawmakers about worries regarding Huawei Technologies Co.’s increasing AI abilities.
He raised these concerns during a private meeting between Nvidia executives and the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday. They discussed Huawei’s AI chips and how restrictions on Nvidia’s chips in China could boost Huawei’s chip competitiveness.
The senior staff source stated, “If DeepSeek R1 had been trained on (Huawei chips) or a future open-source Chinese model had been trained to be highly optimized to Huawei chips, that would risk creating a global market demand for Huawei chips.”
Nvidia spokesperson John Rizzo said in a statement, “Jensen met with the House Foreign Affairs Committee to discuss the strategic importance of AI as national infrastructure and the need to invest in U.S. manufacturing. He reaffirmed Nvidia’s full support for the government’s efforts to promote American technology and interests around the world.”
U.S. export controls, starting under President Donald Trump’s first administration, have targeted Nvidia’s chips. These chips are crucial for creating chatbots, image generators, and other AI systems. Nvidia has responded by creating chips for the Chinese market that follow the evolving regulations.
However, last month the Trump administration asked the company to halt sales of its latest China-specific chip, the H20. Chinese customers had increased their orders for these chips due to affordable AI models like DeepSeek’s.
Reuters reported last month that Huawei has moved in to fill Nvidia’s void in China. They are preparing to ship a chip designed to rival Nvidia’s products in large quantities.
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