London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Monday, Oct 06, 2025

With new China AI chip restrictions, U.S. takes aim at a critical niche

With new China AI chip restrictions, U.S. takes aim at a critical niche

The United States beefed up its effort to cut off the flow of advanced technology to China by instructing Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD.O) to stop sending their flagship artificial intelligence chips there.
While the news shocked the chip sector by the time markets closed Thursday, sending the Philadelphia semiconductor index down 1.9% and Nvidia and AMD down 7.6% and 3% respectively, the letters from the U.S. officials appeared to target a narrow but critical part of China's computing industry.

The regulations appear to focus on chips called GPUs with the most powerful computing capabilities, a critical but niche market with only two meaningful players, Nvidia and AMD. Their only potential rival - Intel Corp (INTC.O) - is trying to break into the market but has not released competitive products.

Originally designed for video games, the usage of GPUs, or graphic processing units, have been expanded to a wider array of applications that include handling artificial intelligence work like image recognition, categorizing cat photos or scouring digital satellite imagery for military equipment. Because all the chip suppliers are American, the U.S. controls access to the technology.

Some national security experts saw the U.S. move as a long time coming.

GPUs "have been totally uncontrolled to China and to Russia, so in a lot of ways I see this action as kind of catching up to where the controls probably should have been if we were really serious about trying to slow China’s AI growth," said Emily Kilcrease, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security.

The U.S. Department of Commerce, which declined to comment on the specifics of whatever new rules it may be developing, appears to have targeted the effort narrowly.

The only products Nvidia said would be affected are its A100 and H100 chips. Those chips cost tens of thousands of dollars each, with full computers containing the chips costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Similarly, AMD said that only its most powerful MI250 chip - a version of which is being used at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, one of several U.S. supercomputing sites that supports nuclear weapons - is affected by the new requirement. Less powerful chips such as AMD's MI210 and below are not affected.

What the affected chips share is the ability to carry out calculations for artificial intelligence work quickly, at huge scale and with high precision. Less powerful AI chips can work quickly at lower levels of precision, which is sufficient for tagging photos of friends and where the cost of an occasional mistake is low - but are insufficient for designing fighter jets.

The only major market rival to AMD and Nvidia's chips is Intel's still-unreleased Ponte Vecchio chip, whose first customer is Argonne National Lab, another U.S. installation that supports nuclear weapons.

"While we understand the U.S. Government is continuing to look at new restrictions, no new export control rules have been published and there are currently no changes to our business," Intel told Reuters in a statement. "We are closely monitoring the process."
Comments

Anna 3 year ago
And we are not at war with China (yet) and the US stops the flow of goods. Maybe China should stop the flow of goods to Walmart and sit back and watch America imploded

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
FBI Removes Agents Who Kneeled at 2020 Protest, Citing Breach of Professional Conduct
Trump Alleges ‘Triple Sabotage’ at United Nations After Escalator and Teleprompter Failures
Shock in France: 5 Years in Prison for Former President Nicolas Sarkozy
Tokyo’s Jimbōchō Named World’s Coolest Neighbourhood for 2025
European Officials Fear Trump May Shift Blame for Ukraine War onto EU
BNP Paribas Abandons Ban on 'Controversial Weapons' Financing Amid Europe’s Defence Push
Typhoon Ragasa Leaves Trail of Destruction Across East Asia Before Making Landfall in China
The Personality Rights Challenge in India’s AI Era
Big Banks Rebuild in Hong Kong as Deal Volume Surges
Italy Considers Freezing Retirement Age at 67 to Avert Scheduled Hike
Italian City to Impose Tax on Visiting Dogs Starting in 2026
Arnault Denounces Proposed Wealth Tax as Threat to French Economy
Study Finds No Safe Level of Alcohol for Dementia Risk
Denmark Investigates Drone Incursion, Does Not Rule Out Russian Involvement
Lilly CEO Warns UK Is ‘Worst Country in Europe’ for Drug Prices, Pulls Back Investment
Nigel Farage Emerges as Central Force in British Politics with Reform UK Surge
Disney Reinstates ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ after Six-Day Suspension over Charlie Kirk Comments
U.S. Prosecutors Move to Break Up Google’s Advertising Monopoly
Nvidia Pledges Up to $100 Billion Investment in OpenAI to Power Massive AI Data Center Build-Out
U.S. Signals ‘Large and Forceful’ Support for Argentina Amid Market Turmoil
×