The issue isn't so much these chips but rather the pace.
A year ago intel CEO said China is 10 years behind. Now they're making something that isn't far off from a H100, allowing for a wheelbarrow of salt.
At that rate it's plausible that the next round will be directly competitive or better
If AMD and Intel can't match NVIDIA then how can Huawei?
Huawei doesn't need to match Nvidia, because their clients don't have access to Nvidia. They can claim they match Nvidia, and the claim may be an exaggeration, but the market won't punish them, since there are no alternatives. AMD and Intel don't have that luxury. If they deliver 80% of what Nvidia delivers (at the same price point), they get to sell roughly speaking zero.
Huawei exploits PRC specific market forces.
AMD/Intel have to compete with Nvidia globally (or whatever % of trusted partners). They have to match NVIDIA price/performance.
Huawei doesn't / won't have to compete with Nvidia for long, so they can compete on performance, i.e. using more expensive (less efficient) processes, and more power hungrier chips. The TCO could be higher, but they also don't have to take 40-50% margin like Nvidia, and PRC is less power cost constrained. So possible to make a chip that cost 40% to fabricate vs 20%, but only take 20% of profit instead of 40%. Possible that TCO of that ship uses 2x more power... but local power costs 50%.
Funny how as a Chinese, I told my Canadian friend that I'd bet on one of the Chinese companies catching up to Nvidia (at least partly) before AMD or Intel.
Looking at long term, STEM supply drives these rapidly advancing markets. We have China training so many engineers of all stripes there is a chronic oversupply, cut throat competition between engineers, with the ones who don't make it working in noodle shops. We also have the USA, who has 1/3 the population, is seeing record low attendance at it's colleges and currently attacking it's own universities. Short of another Mao style political upheaval, it's difficult to see how the USA's crown in technological leadership won't be handed over to China in time, if it hasn't already.
That said, smaller countries do out-compete the bigger ones in their specialised areas of expertise despite being many times smaller. Finland builds great ice-breakers, Australia does mining and medical, New Zealand does food products. The same will hold for the USA. They will do perfectly fine once the crown passes, just like the other smaller fish do now. Well, assuming the current kerfuffle doesn't turn into a Mao sized disaster. Right now it does have the same anti-intellectual stench to it, but you will stomp on it before it gets completely out of hand. Surely?
Qualcomm knows how to build CPUs.
And China has a problem with the usa
Nvidia's moat isn't hardware. Instinct and Gaudi series accelerators serve their own niches and aren't the only ones.
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That's a gift from Trump. He locked NVidia and opened the rest of the world to competitors. This is like shooting in the foot. No donations needed, by I expect they will in 2028.