Trump open to Nvidia selling scaled-back Blackwell chip to China
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Mr Trump said he'd consider a deal for Nvidia to ship its Blackwell chips to China if it can design it to be less advanced.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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WASHINGTON – US President Donald Trump signalled on Aug 11 that he would be open to allowing Nvidia to sell a scaled-back version of its most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip to China.
Mr Trump said he would consider a deal that would allow Nvidia to ship its Blackwell chips to China if the company could design it to be less advanced.
“It’s possible I’d make a deal” on a “somewhat enhanced – in a negative way – Blackwell” processor, he said in a briefing with reporters.
“In other words, take 30 per cent to 50 per cent off of it.”
Nvidia declined to comment on the President’s remarks.
Mr Trump made his comment on Nvidia’s Blackwell chip while confirming that he had hammered out a separate, unusual deal
Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) will deliver the same share from MI308 revenues, a person familiar with the situation has said, asking not to be identified discussing internal deliberations.
The revenue-sharing agreement for the H20 chip – and the prospect of yet another one for Nvidia’s Blackwell product – reflects Mr Trump’s consistent effort to engineer a financial payout for America in return for concessions on trade.
Such unprecedented arrangements, however, stand to set a precedent for all American companies doing business in the Asian nation and threaten the US government’s national security rationale for export controls, experts said.
Mr Trump did not say exactly when he might negotiate a deal with Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang on the Blackwell chip, but alluded to a possible meeting soon on the prospect: “I think he’s coming to see me again about that, but that will be an unenhanced version of the big one.”
Nvidia’s Blackwell design is at the heart of the most powerful computers that create and run AI software. Those chips are currently too powerful to be sold into China, according to US restrictions.
Nvidia and smaller rival AMD have seen their revenues in China slashed by increasingly tight US government restrictions on AI chip exports.
While the Trump administration has begun granting permits for some chips to be exported to China, those products are older and only equivalent to domestic Chinese offerings, casting doubt on their attractiveness in that market.
A newer, better offering might help promote Nvidia’s standing with Chinese customers if it can get sign-off from the administration.
When the US tightened restrictions in April, Nvidia said it would work on another chip for the Chinese market and would seek permission to export that one.
It cautioned that the older Hopper design, the basis of the H20 chip being sent to China, could no longer be reduced in capabilities. BLOOMBERG
