Banned US AI Chips in High Demand at Chinese State Institutes (reuters.com) 44
High-profile universities and state-run research institutes in China have been relying on a U.S. computing chip to power their artificial intelligence (AI) technology but whose export to the country Washington has now restricted, a Reuters review showed. From the report: U.S. chip designer Nvidia last week said U.S. government officials have ordered it to stop exporting its A100 and H100 chips to China. Local peer Advanced Micro Devices also said new licence requirements now prevent export to China of its advanced AI chip MI250. The development signalled a major escalation of a U.S. campaign to stymie China's technological capability as tension bubbles over the fate of Taiwan, where chips for Nvidia and almost every other major chip firm are manufactured.
China views Taiwan as a rogue province and has not ruled out force to bring the democratically governed island under its control. Responding to the restrictions, China branded them a futile attempt to impose a technology blockade on a rival. A Reuters review of more than a dozen publicly available government tenders over the past two years indicated that among some of China's most strategically important research institutes, there is high demand - and need - for Nvidia's signature A100 chips. Tsinghua University, China's highest-ranked higher education institution globally, spent over $400,000 last October on two Nvidia AI supercomputers, each powered by four A100 chips, one of the tenders showed. In the same month, the Institute of Computing Technology, part of top research group, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), spent around $250,000 on A100 chips. The school of artificial intelligence at a CAS university in July this year also spent about $200,000 on high-tech equipment including a server partly powered by A100 chips. In November, the cybersecurity college of Guangdong-based Jinan University spent over $93,000 on an Nvidia AI supercomputer, while its school of intelligent systems science and engineering spent almost $100,000 on eight A100 chips just last month. Less well-known institutes and universities supported by municipal and provincial governments, such as in Shandong, Henan and Chongqing, also bought A100 chips, the tenders showed.
China views Taiwan as a rogue province and has not ruled out force to bring the democratically governed island under its control. Responding to the restrictions, China branded them a futile attempt to impose a technology blockade on a rival. A Reuters review of more than a dozen publicly available government tenders over the past two years indicated that among some of China's most strategically important research institutes, there is high demand - and need - for Nvidia's signature A100 chips. Tsinghua University, China's highest-ranked higher education institution globally, spent over $400,000 last October on two Nvidia AI supercomputers, each powered by four A100 chips, one of the tenders showed. In the same month, the Institute of Computing Technology, part of top research group, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), spent around $250,000 on A100 chips. The school of artificial intelligence at a CAS university in July this year also spent about $200,000 on high-tech equipment including a server partly powered by A100 chips. In November, the cybersecurity college of Guangdong-based Jinan University spent over $93,000 on an Nvidia AI supercomputer, while its school of intelligent systems science and engineering spent almost $100,000 on eight A100 chips just last month. Less well-known institutes and universities supported by municipal and provincial governments, such as in Shandong, Henan and Chongqing, also bought A100 chips, the tenders showed.
laughable (Score:3)
Anyone who thinks China won't just use another country/company to straw purchase these "banned" chips is kidding themselves.
This is just another "do nothing" poke at the eye of an adversary without any meaningful impact.
In other news, exports of Hershey chocolate to North Korea have been banned. That'll show 'em.
Film at 11.
Re:laughable (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:laughable (Score:4)
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Just like previous sanctions, the end effect isn't to restrict Chinese access to the tech, it's to incentivise China to develop their own equivalents that aren't subject to any US control.
No.
It's to incentivize them to develop their own sub-par equivalents. That's the entire point of it. It's a gamble that they can't produce technology as good as ours.
What meaningful control do you think exists if they're building war materiel with our parts? That we can stop the supply? Sure. But guess what- they've already built the shit.
So in the future when Russia wants to buy more high-tech components for its cruise missiles it no longer has to try and bypass US sanctions, it can just order the Chinese equivalents wholesale off Alibaba (free shipping if you buy more than five units!).
Hah! Were we so lucky!
Cruise missiles that had a 40% chance of launching to begin with and an additional 40% chance of failure during flight? I call that a win by any m
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It's to incentivize them to develop their own sub-par equivalents. That's the entire point of it. It's a gamble that they can't produce technology as good as ours.
By "ours" I assume you mean the US. China produces tech every bit as good as, and in some cases better than, the US *cough*5G*cough*, it's just that most of what you see is the cut-rate junk you find on Aliexpress. When they care about doing it right they produce pretty good tech, it's just when you're getting the cheapest junk from the lowest-cost manufacturer that it's, well, cheap junk.
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By "ours" I assume you mean the US.
yup.
China produces tech every bit as good as, and in some cases better than, the US *cough*5G*cough*,
lol, give me a fucking break.
Chinese technology is 5-30 years behind the US in almost every sector.
Being a network and software engineer by trade, I have some experience with Huawei. Particularly their Cisco 6500 rip-off chassis units running the literal ripped-and-rebranded 2005 Cisco firmware.
The US has 3 major global 5G networking gear manufacturers.
The technology was primarily developed in the US and Europe.
And you can guarantee that none of them are ripped off Ciscos being maintained by dudes
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Can't name one that has any merit or meaning.
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Why Venezuela? (Score:4, Interesting)
The US fascination with Cuba is a cold-war relic. However, the concerns about Venezuela are more modern. Venezuela used to export a lot of oil to the US, and that vanished with the Chavez government. Furthermore, Venezuela nationalized assets from US oil companies and refused to pay those companies for other transactions. There is obviously more to the story, but at least with Venezuela, there are direct economic issues involved.
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When will you stop freeing Cuba?
As soon as you stop beating up poor innocent strawmen.
The US stopped freeing Cuba a long, long time ago.
Our beef with Cuba now is a matter of a deep-seated dislike for communist dictators.
I do agree with you that it's counterproductive at this point.
But comparing Cuba to the Philippines is pretty fucking silly. Particularly since 1991.
When the US has enough firepower amassed in Key West to turn Cuba into a slate of glass, then we'll discuss parallels.
This blocus coming from a such generous country doesn't make sense.
I do agree with you. But see above. The US, misguid
Re: laughable (Score:2)
It is imperialism, by definition, though imperialism isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's more about what you're trying to do and why.
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Most of Europe is imperialist by that definition.
The political science definition of imperialism is a bit more nuanced, and the US is not generally considered imperialist, despite having financial and military hegemony.
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Re:laughable (Score:4, Insightful)
If you think "imperialism" has anything to do with US policy toward China, you're not a bright individual.
So in that vein, the world hates the US because we got it, and you don't.
What's it? A voice that matters.
But all joking aside, the world also doesn't hate the US.
Ethnocentric shit-for-brains often do, though.
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At least we're doing something.
We'd rather you didn't.
"Build bridges, not walls"
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Ya, go fuck yourself dude.
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You're boringly predictable...
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Anyone moving any significant volume will be easy to notice. Last year country X bought $1M in chips and this year its $100M. Not rocket science to figure out. Add in US intelligence services and I think very few countries would be willing to deal with the possible repercussions of getting caught. It will happen to be sure, but again, this will dramatically decrease Chin
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"sanctions"... (Score:3)
and there SMIC comes out with similar chips within 6 months...
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and there SMIC comes out with similar chips within 6 months...
And six months after that the USA is flooded with cheap Chinese AI chips. Spyware included.
It's better to be in control but noooo, AC wants to feel like he's "doing something".
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Indeed, in principle you could make some pretty impressive chips without needing EUV by adopting the approach taking with the cerebras chip.
Targeted motivation (Score:1)
This has likely just kicked off a cold war with China well and truly.
If ever China needed a motivation to put serious effort into creating GPU competition to NVidia then this is it I think. A looooot of engineers will likely be assigned to working on this now I expect.
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China has put tons of effort into making modern chips, for more than a decade, with very little to show for it.
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"Little"? They made a supercomputer that was #1 in the TOP500 list.
And they have several GPU manufacturers. At least three. Two started delivering just this year.
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Don't worry. China's ingrained corruption will make it very unlikely they'll ever develop anything comparable.
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But they'll automate corruption and do it cheaper than the US.
I'm with laughable (Score:2)
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this has nothing to do with GPU's, please try and keep up, its in the fucking title for christ's sake
Not many chips ... (Score:2)
Maybe I'm incredibly lucky, but I'm just a no-name researcher at a mid-tier university, and I have a server with 8 A100s in it. Calling a machine with 4 A100s in it a "supercomputer" sounds like a stretch.
Pricing seems off (Score:1)