chips

Exynos had been the ugly duckling of chips for years. BMW thinks the opposite.

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When choosing a high-end Samsung, the dilemma between betting on the Exynos version or the Qualcomm version has always been clear. In fact, until just a generation ago Samsung reserved its chips Exynos for the “non-Ultra” models, and provided its flagship with Snapdragon Elite on duty. Its chip division has been in crisis for almost a yearbut the latest leaks point to the comeback being close. Meanwhile, the company has a plan to revitalize the income of this business area: bet on the automotive industry. bmw. According to Korean sourcesBMW has chosen the Samsung Exynos Auto V720 to give life to a very important vehicle for the German brand: the next iX3. It will be the first electric car to use this platform. One of the current wars in the automotive sector is precisely to lead in infotainment systems, and there the processor plays a fundamental role. The Exynos Auto V720. This processor will be manufactured in a five nanometer process, and its announcement will be imminent according to the source. It is not the first time that BMW has opted for the Korean company, since flagship vehicles such as those of the Series 7 of the company have been betting on platforms such as the Exynos Auto V920 since 2023. Why is it important. Samsung’s Samsung LSI (Large Scale Integration) division is responsible for the design and development of chips and solutions for semiconductors. It is not only responsible for manufacturing Exynos processors, but also ISOCELL image sensors or the 5G modems themselves. Without a detailed shock plan, the data on the table tells us of estimated losses of 1 trillion won in 2024, a result that was partly due to the inability to integrate the processor Exynos 2500 in the Galaxy S25 series. Beyond smartphones, a crucial division for Samsung, fully entering the automotive world is an important step to clean up its accounts. In fact, Samsung’s move goes beyond simply supplying the Exynos Auto. Recently, Harman (Samsung subsidiary) agreed to purchase ZF Friedrichshafen’s ADAS unit to reinforce its presence in advanced assistance systems (cameras, radars, critical computing, etc.). Interior of the BMW 7 Series The software war. The current war in the automotive world is not about the engine, It’s in the software and the screens. It’s getting to that pointthat manufacturers such as Volkswagen have come to declare that “they are not phones, they are cars”, as an argument to reintroduce the haptic buttons that their customers missed so much. The European Union itself has had to take action on the matter, and the new Euro NCAP will be valued very positively the return of physical buttons. Despite this, screens are here to stay. Image | bmw

AI doesn’t just live on chips, it also requires massive energy, so Google has bought an energy company

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The AI needs a lot of energy and technology companies are already planning how to power their huge data centers. On the table there are such creative ideas as take them to space either submerge them in the sea to reduce its consumption. Google has opted for a more immediate solution: it has purchased an electricity company for data centers. The agreement. Google has purchased Intersect Powera company dedicated to developing energy infrastructure, including renewable energy sources, for data centers. Google has paid $4.75 billion for the San Francisco-based company, in addition to assuming its debt. According to Sundar Pichai: “Intersect will help us expand our capacity, operate with greater agility in the construction of new power generation facilities in line with the new load of data centers, and reinvent energy solutions to drive innovation and American leadership” Why it is important. The agreements of AI companies are usually focused on computing capacity, not energy. This agreement underscores the importance of energy in AI infrastructure, putting it on the same level as the very chips it powers. Data centers are being developed at a brutal pace and energy is presenting itself as a bottleneck. Satya Nadella already said it: there is no power for so many chips. It’s Google ensuring enough “food” for its chips. Yontersec. Google’s relationship with Intersect began just a year ago, when big tech acquired a minority stake in the company. Under this collaboration, several projects have come to light in their data centers. Both these projects and all Intersect personnel are part of the agreement. What the agreement does not include are other company assets, mainly located in Texas and California, worth 15 billion. These will continue to operate under the Intersect brand. Energy. In 2023, data centers already accounted for 4% of the energy consumption of the entire United States, and at the rate at which they are being built, the figure will continue to increase (there is talk of 12% by 2028). The problem is that US electrical infrastructure cannot support that pace and is having consequences for consumers through price increases in electricity. Google assures that with this agreement it will be able to guarantee “an abundant, reliable and affordable energy supply that allows the construction of data center infrastructures without passing on costs to network customers.” Image | Wikipedia, Intersect In Xataka | Talking about artificial intelligence is talking about energy, and the fashionable term is ‘bragawatts’

Samsung opens the era of 2nm chips with the Exynos 2600. Chances are we won’t notice much

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Samsung has announced officially the Exynos 2600 SoC. This smartphone chip is especially notable for one particular feature: it is the first to be manufactured with 2 nm photolithography. The question, of course, is whether that will change things much. Why is it important. Node jumps in photolithographic processes are especially striking because they usually lead to significant improvements in performance and efficiency. By reducing the scale it is possible to fit more transistors in the same space, which in essence ends up giving us “more for the same.” The Samsung Exynos 2600 goes precisely in that direction. The data. Samsung’s new System-on-a-Chip (SoC) boasts above all of that new 2nm GAA (Gate-All-Around) manufacturing process, and is composed of the following elements: CPU: ten cores in total. The configuration features one 3.8 GHz C1-Ultra core, three 3.25 GHz C1-Pro cores, and six 2.75 GHz C1-Pro cores. GPU: Samsung Xclipse 960 NPU: 32K MAC What can we expect. According to Samsung, this new CPU increases performance by 39% compared to the Exynos 2500. The Xclipse 960 GPU manages to double the computing capacity of its predecessor and 50% more performance in ray-tracing. And finally, the NPU allows 113% more performance than its predecessor, which will allow you to enjoy AI functions in a theoretically notable way. 320 MP sensors. Another of the differentiating elements of this SoC is the support for sensors of up to 320 MP, in addition to offering zero latency for captures of up to 108 MP. Or what is the same: you take snapshots thanks to that processing capacity. It is also compatible with 8K recording at 30 fps and 4K at 120 fps with HDR. Less throttling. One of the most important novelties of these chips is Heath Path Block technology (HPB). This system improves thermal conductivity using new materials, which reduces thermal resistance and helps the chip maintain high performance for longer. It will therefore be more difficult for us to notice drops in chip performance due to potential overheating, for example in gaming sessions with the mobile phone that integrates this SoC. If that promise is fulfilled, we would be facing a potential solution to a problem that has traditionally been criticized in Exynos chips. Will we notice anything? The truth is that current SoCs are already true computing beasts in all sections and usually give so much room for maneuver that it is difficult to notice differences between them in our daily lives. That perception is misleading, because these hardware advances allow us to take advantage of that performance and efficiency “without realizing it.” Increasingly better photos captured and processed instantly, absolute fluidity in the interface even with high resolutions and refresh rates, or of course gaming in increasingly demanding games are scenarios in which these chips do their best. remains to be seen if Google finally goes ahead with its “PC mode”an area in which having powerful chips like this can offer a user experience much closer to the usual laptop/PC. Competition for Qualcomm. Theoretically, the Samsung chip will be able to compete head to head with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5. Some previous leaks That’s what they pointed out, but without a doubt we could be facing a great option for a market that will certainly benefit from that competition. Prepared for the Galaxy S26. Samsung is expected to use the new Exynos 2600 in its Galaxy S26 series, although it is not clear at the moment whether that decision will be global and will depend on the region. A global commitment would allow, for example, to integrate this chip on the Galaxy S26 and use Qualcomm chips only in the S26 Ultra, but everything remains to be confirmed. Of course, that type of strategy would be the definitive litmus test for Samsung Foundry, which in recent years has clearly been one step behind in performance and efficiency compared to its competitors. In Xataka | The Samsung Galaxy S26 will be much more than a phone for Samsung: the future of Exynos depends on it

with smuggled NVIDIA chips, according to The Information

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The Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek would have been training his next model with thousands of NVIDIA Blackwell chipsthe most advanced on the market and whose export to China is expressly prohibited by the United States. So The Information states itciting six sources close to the company, who claim that the chips would have arrived in the country through smuggling. ANDl alleged smuggling scheme. According to the media, the chips would have been acquired legally through data centers in countries where their sale is allowed. Once installed and inspected by NVIDIA or its authorized distributors such as Dell or Super Micro Computer, the servers would have been disassembled and the components would have been shipped to China in separate pieces, passing customs under false declarations. This method would allow no trace of the end user to be left. The response of NVIDIA. The company has flatly denied these accusations in a statement: “We have not seen any evidence or received notices of ‘ghost data centers’ built to deceive us and our OEM partners, which are then dismantled, smuggled and rebuilt elsewhere.” NVIDIA adds that, although this type of smuggling “seems implausible,” it investigates any information it receives about it. Why Blackwell chips are so valuable to DeepSeek. NVIDIA’s Blackwell processors began shipping in the final quarter of 2024, with companies like Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI being the first to receive them. These chips include specialized hardware to accelerate sparse computing (Sparse Computing), executing this type of calculations up to twice as fast as traditional methods. According to The Information, DeepSeek would have been using a technique called “sparse attention” that activates only certain parts of the model to respond to requests instead of the entire model, which significantly reduces inference costs. Blackwells would be especially useful for this approach, although their application in larger models is proving more complicated than anticipated. Geopolitical context. US President Donald Trump came to boast to Chinese leader Xi Jinping that Blackwell chips are “10 years ahead of any other chip” and that he would not allow China access to them. However, this week Trump authorized the sale of H200 chips from NVIDIA to China, a generation before the Blackwells, although Beijing is still considering whether to allow its acquisition. Of course, this measure could reduce demand for smuggled Blackwell chips in the Asian country. lThe difficulties of enforcing restrictions. Most NVIDIA chips are manufactured in Taiwan and sold through a complex network of distributors around the world. Jacob Feldgoise, analyst at the Center for Security and Emerging Technologies at Georgetown University account to the media that “the burden of proof to enforce and prosecute chip smuggling cases is quite high. Clear and convincing evidence is needed.” DeepSeek remains silent. The Chinese startup has not responded to the allegations. Previously, DeepSeek had trained its models with older NVIDIA chips: 10,000 A100 units stored by its parent company, hedge fund High-Flyer Capital Management, before US export restrictions took effect in 2022. The company’s research documents from last year indicated that they also had used hopper chipsthe generation immediately before Blackwell. DeepSeek faces several sticks from Washington: in April, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party published a report calling the startup “a profound threat” to American national security, accusing it of illegally using export-controlled NVIDIA chips. Qregulatory repression. NVIDIA confirmed this week that it has developed a verification technology location through software that could indicate in which country its chips operate, although it has not yet been launched. This tool would use the computing capabilities of your GPUs to monitor the performance and location of the processors. The company has clarified that this is read-only software that does not allow NVIDIA to remotely control the chips or disable them. “There is no off switch,” the company said. Cover image | DeepSeek, Xataka with Mockuuups Studio and NVIDIA In Xataka | If anyone thought that Europe had no role in the race for AI, Mistral has something to tell them

Jensen Huang managed to convince Trump to sell his H200 chips in China. Now China doesn’t want to buy them

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When something gets into Jensen Huang’s head, he goes after it and often succeeds. This is what happened in July of this year when managed to convince Trump to let him sell his H20 chip in China. History has just repeated itself and has managed to the president lifts the veto on H200 chips (although keeping a part). The problem is China, which does not see it very clearly. what has happened. China is preparing restrictions aimed at limiting access to NVIDIA’s H200 chips, according to Financial Times. If these restrictions end up being implemented, it will mean that the chips will not be available to any company that wants to buy them; They will first go through a pre-approval process, which includes explaining why chips from domestic companies do not meet their needs. In addition, there is another fact that adds up: for the first time, China has put national chips from companies like Huawei and Cambricon in its official procurement list. This list is a kind of purchasing guide for public institutions and large state groups that move billions a year in contracts. Why is it important. It is further proof that the Chinese government’s priority is not to depend on American technology for the development of its AI. Their bet is to favor the use of national chips even though they are not technologically at the level of NVIDIA chips. It’s not the same. China has already responded with distrust when NVIDIA obtained permission to sell H20 chips months ago and it seems that now they want to follow the same path, but there is a big difference: the H20 chips were the most basic, the H200 GPUs are much more advanced and represent a greater technological advantage, especially in more demanding tasks such as training large language models. What Chinese companies say. According to South China Morning PostAI companies in China such as ByteDance, Alibaba or Tencent continue to prefer to use H200s because they are much more powerful than the national alternatives offered by Huawei or Cambricon. Additionally, much of these companies’ code is based on NVIDIA’s Hopper microarchitecture, allowing them to use the chips without having to rewrite the code. On the other hand, developers who do not need maximum performance are wary of using American chips given the instability of the situation. The energy. NVIDIA’s CEO has been around for a while pressing for the US to lift these restrictions. Their pitch is that if China does not have access to NVIDIA chips, then they will improve their domestic chips and win the AI ​​race, but there is more. He has also warned that China has a huge energy advantagelargely thanks to government subsidies. He has already managed to convince Trump to sell chips and now the most difficult thing remains. Image | Wikipedia In Xataka | China is very clear about what it must do to win the chip war against the US: resort to its technological geniuses

Huawei has a patent with which to manufacture 2nm chips. The only problem is that it’s just a patent.

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Huawei has just applied for a patent in which a new and unique process of advanced chip production. The patent focuses on improving one of the limitations of the technology of deep ultraviolet photolithography (UVP) to try to compete in this way with the extreme ultraviolet machines (UVE) to which China still unable to access. There are, however, many uncertainties here. The patent. Huawei formally submitted the technical documentation in June 2022 to the Chinese patent office, allowing the invention to be “protected” since then. The detailed content of their study was made public in January 2025, but It is now that it has come to light. The patent is only applied for, not granted or granted. The patent office is examining the application to determine if it meets the requirements. Why is it important. This patent tries to address the limitations of the so-called edge placement error (EPE, Edge Placement Error) in the advanced interconnection process used when manufacturing advanced chips. The method discovered makes it theoretically possible to use “metal spacings” smaller than 21 nm, even when using deep ultraviolet (UVP) technology instead of extreme ultraviolet (UVE), which is the most advanced photolithographic technology today… and to which Chinese manufacturers like Huawei do not have access. If it achieves its objective, the firm could have access, for example, to chips that would theoretically compete even with chips made with 2nm photolithography. Metal spacing? That term (metal pitch in English) refers to the minimum distance that exists between the metal lines that form the interconnections within the integrated circuit or, in this case, the chip. These lines carry power and data signals between the transistors, and that metal spacing is extraordinarily small for advanced nodes. The objective of the patent is precisely to allow the manufacture of these lines with a spacing of less than 21 nm. This gives rise to a possible process that could compete with the 2nm UVE photolithography used, for example, by TSMC. The important word there is “could.” Edge Placement Error (EPE). EPE is the error that occurs when a pattern on a chip is not placed exactly where it was intended by the chip design. The closer that metal spacing is, the smaller the EPE margin must be to prevent the lines from touching and causing a short circuit. At this scale it is incredibly complex to solve this problem, and Huawei’s patent precisely proposes a way to achieve it. Supervitaminizing “old” lithography. What makes this method possible is that UVP photolithography, less powerful and advanced than UVE, can be used to compete with it. This method would allow “jumping” the limits that this process now faces, and which normally had many difficulties in going beyond 21 nm. A double hard mask process of two materials and a special patterning scheme are introduced that theoretically allow us to go below 21 nm. and even 5 nm which are already very complicated to achieve with EUV. In short: China could achieve advanced chips without the need for use the most advanced ASML machinesto which you do not have access. But. Although the technique is apparently striking, there are two big problems here. The first and most important is that this is just a patent and that does not mean that the process can be transferred to reality. The difficulties in doing so are enormous, and that leads us to the second problem: the effectiveness of production would probably be very low and the yield (process success rate) would be greatly affected. That is to say: of all the chips theoretically produced with this technique, only a small part would be valid, which would waste a huge part of the investment. In Xataka | In its race to make advanced chips, China has tried to copy ASML. It’s going wrong

The US has insisted that TSMC manufacture chips in Arizona. The reality: it is a disastrous idea

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TSMC, the world’s largest semiconductor maker, has long been pushing for unprecedented expansion outside Taiwan. The initiative includes large projects in the United States, Japan and Germany, but does not respond to market demand, but rather to geopolitical pressure and a chip war that wants to try to “repatriate” this type of process. It’s a terrible idea. Morris Chang knows it’s a mistake. Despite the political urgency, the economic viability of these factories abroad has been questioned by TSMC founder Dr. Morris Chang. He already had the previous experience with the WafertTech factory in the US in 1996, and has qualified Arizona initiative as “a very expensive exercise in futility” Everything one hour away. Chang’s skepticism is based on the belief that TSMC’s operations and profitability are intrinsically dependent on its ecosystem, which is entirely concentrated in Taiwan. The Hsinchu Science Park “cluster” allows hundreds of technology partners to operate within a “one-hour” radius, facilitating problem resolution and providing ultra-fast logistics and unparalleled coordination. TSMC is still 90% Taiwanese. Despite that global expansion, TSMC remains deeply Taiwanese, with more than 90% of its manufacturing capacity and nearly 90% of its employees on the island. That’s where your massive, highly trained and qualified engineering talent base is. That is again a key factor in its competitive advantage, and in fact the company has already warned its employees in the US that they should adhere to the work culture of the Taiwanese company. Arizona produces, but it is more expensive. That attempt to replicate Taiwanese efficiency in Arizona has revealed something important: although TSMC has achieved competitive performance in its first production runs with 4nm photolithography, the cost of the wafers is significantly higher. The local supply of raw materials and equipment remains insufficient, making the factory dependent on Asia and is a bottleneck for the efficiency of the production cycle. Skilled labor shortages and permitting and bureaucracy, which further slow things down, add considerable operational costs. Japan and Germany, next objectives. TSMC has two major expansion projects in Japan (JASM) and Germany (ESMC). These locations will focus on much less advanced photolithographic nodes (28/16 nm) and will focus on meeting the demand of some specialized customers such as Sony for image sensors in Japan or Bosch in Europe. The scale of these investments is less than that of Arizona, which aims to be the world’s largest advanced chip factory… if planned future phases are completed. A double edged sword. TSMC’s expansion has two sides. On the one hand, TSMC consolidates its technological leadership and its strategic role as a “silicon shield” against China. On the other hand, it generates internal anxiety about the possible “leakage” of advanced technology and talent that could weaken national sovereignty in the long term. US pressure even extended to veto the possibility of establishing a TSMC factory in the United Arab Emirates. TSMC does not expand by pleasure, but by pressure. Traditionally, TSMC only builds new factories in response to real demand from its customers. Here the reason has been very different, and geopolitical pressure has forced moves that the company would probably never have made otherwise. Here the different subsidy programs (CHIPS Act in the US, European Chip Law) try to repatriate part of the manufacturing and thus mitigate Asian dependence, but it’s not clear at all that they achieve it. Image | TSMC In Xataka | Japan is rapidly reconquering the chip industry. It has just successfully manufactured its first 2nm transistor

An investment of 2,350 million will make Extremadura a global supplier of diamonds for chips

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Trujillo will be a world center for the production of synthetic diamonds. A factory will be created there with a budget of 2.77 billion dollars (almost 2.4 billion euros) in which the Spanish Society for Technological Transformation will participate (SETT), with 753 million, and the American company Diamond Foundry (DF). And those diamonds will not be used for jewelry, but for especially powerful chips. The silicon problem. Current silicon chips have hit a “thermal wall.” By making them faster and more powerful, they get so hot that they lose efficiency or burn out. This slows down the progress of these chips and their application in fields such as artificial intelligence or automotive. Alternatives have been sought for a long timeand the diamond is precisely one of the most striking. The evolution of Trujillo. The Diamond Foundry factory will not make jewelry, but the synthetic diamond wafers it first produced two years ago. The diamond has a thermal conductivity much higher than that of silicon, with values ​​ranging between 1,000 to 2,200 W/mK compared to 153 W/mK for silicon. Or what is the same: it allows us to guarantee that, as they highlighted on IEE Spectrumthe chips of the future will remain “fresh.” The impact. By using diamond as the base or substrate for these chips, it is possible to run them at extreme speeds without overheating. This will position Spain as the world center of this critical technology. The North American company It already had two plants in Trujillo in which monocrystalline diamond (SCD) ingots were produced. The factories are also powered by solar energy, which is abundant in the Extremadura region. Zaragoza as a great ally. Those responsible for Diamond Foundry they explain in the official statement that the new factory is already underway with two construction shifts to accelerate the works. The ingots (the “raw” form of the material) will then go through a singling or cutting process that “slices” them into very thin sheets. These sheets, which are initially rough, are polished at a microscopic level and packaged in a sterile environment. Precisely this “post-processing” phase of production will be carried out in Zaragoza. The investment. The total budget they talk about in DF is 2,770 million dollars, about 2,392 million euros at the exchange rate. Of that amount, the SETT—which groups together previous investments such as PERTE Chip—, will contribute 753 million euros according to DF. It is expected that in the first ten years of the project the contribution to the Spanish GDP will be around 2,150 million euros, and it is expected to generate around 500 direct jobs and more than 1,600 indirect jobs. How to produce synthetic diamonds. While natural diamonds they take time to produce between 1,000 and 3,300 million years old, in Trujillo they are manufactured in approximately one month. To achieve this, DF uses 20 plasma reactors that exceed 1,000 degrees in temperature and generate conditions similar to those found in nature. The process starts with a 20.0 x 20.0 x 0.2 mm diamond “seed” that, when subjected to a combination of gases and a microwave process, grows until it reaches the optimal dimensions for use. Di Caprio, among investors. A curiosity: the San Francisco-based company was founded in 2012 by Martin Roscheisen and Jeremy Scholz, but what is surprising is its list of investors. Among them are iPod co-creator Tony Fadeel, Twitter founder Evan Williams and actor Leonardo di Caprio. The water problem. Diamond Foundry’s plants in Trujillo have faced significant problems related to their water supply. It is estimated that the plants need at least 730,000 cubic meters of water per year, which exceeds the annual drinking water consumption of the entire population of Trujillo. Various platforms such as Save El Berrocal and Ecologistas en Acción have warned of that danger, although Diamond Foundry has defended that its plan is based on the reuse of water from the Trujillo Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP). The Extremadura Government gave the green light to some modifications to the original DF project and considered that the factories would not produce significant adverse effects on the environment. In Xataka | China defies geology: it manufactures in a week what the Earth takes a billion years to do

Chinese electric car manufacturers opted to develop their own chips. He already plans to sell them to others.

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In 2024, Nio advertisement the world’s first 5nm chip for autonomous driving, being an important step towards technological independence from a Chinese manufacturer of such caliber. A year and a half after its announcement, the company is now beginning the external marketing of that chip, according to they count from Latepost. In this way, Nio is on the eve of transforming one of its most expensive investments into a potential source of income. Just like point The electric vehicle maker has already begun providing technology licenses to an automotive chip company. A multimillion-dollar project that seeks profitability. The development of Shenji NX9031 It has involved an investment of billions of yuan. William Li (Li Bin), CEO of Nio, revealed that the R&D expenditure on this chip was equivalent to the cost of building 1,000 battery exchange stations, which would place the investment above 140 million dollars. The project, started in 2021, has involved more than 600 professionals covering front and back design, verification and testing. What makes this chip special. Made with automotive-grade 5-nanometer technology, the Shenji NX9031 promises approximately four times the computing power of Nvidia’s Orin-X. Zhang Danyu, head of Nio’s chip division, pointed out in May that in some of their specifications they even surpass industry-standard chips and that their mass production began several months before Nvidia’s latest smart driving chip, the Thor-U. It is currently integrated into models such as the ET9, ES6 2025 and EC6. How much does a technology license cost?. According to share From Latepost, the value of these license agreements varies significantly depending on the type of authorization. An individual intellectual property license could be worth several million dollars, while a technical authorization at the system-on-chip (SoC) level could reach hundreds of millions of dollars. A new source of income. That the Nio chip begins to be marketed externally comes at a great time for the company, especially now that the manufacturer faces pressure significant from investors and has promised to become profitable in the fourth quarter. The company has intensified its efforts this year to reduce expenses and explore new sources of income. In March, Li Bin already advertisement publicly at the China EV 100 Forum that Nio chips and operating systems would be open to the industry. “If they want to buy the best chips, they can contact Nio,” he said then. What it means for the future of Nio. According to Li Bin, the chip provides a cost optimization of approximately 10,000 yuan ($1,400) per vehicle in the brand’s own models. Now, with the external license, Nio not only recovers part of its investment, but also positions itself as a technology provider for other manufacturers in the automotive sector. In Xataka | The longest straight road in the world is a mental challenge: 240 km without curves, in the middle of the desert and with truck traffic

The US vetoed NVIDIA’s most powerful chips in China. I didn’t count on an unexpected problem: Indonesia

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NVIDIA is at the center of the technological war between China and the United States. After the blockadethe US allowed the company sell a version of its H20 chips specific for the Chinese market, but the most powerful chips, The Blackwells are still banned in China. Or so we believed. What is happening. Donald Trump made it clear that he does not want China to have access to Blackwell chips, but despite the blockade, an investigation by the Wall Street Journal shows how there are Chinese companies benefiting from the computing power of these chips using legal shortcuts. The process. The investigation details the process that NVIDIA’s Blackwell chips go through until INF Tech, a Shanghai-based startup, uses the computing power. NVIDIA sells its chips to Aivres: Aivres is a Silicon Valley company partially owned by Inspur, a Chinese company that is on the US blacklist. NVIDIA could not do business with Inspur or its partners, but the blockade does not affect partners based in the US, as is the case with Aivres. Aivres sells the chips to Indonesia: specifically to an Indonesian communications provider called Indosat Ooredo Hutchison. The agreement includes the sale of 32 NVIDIA GB200 racks with 72 Blackwell chips each; more than 2,300 chips worth $100 million. Indonesia sells computing power to China: The end customer for this cloud computing power is INF Tech, which will use it to train AI in financial and medical research applications. This point is key as we will see later. Why it is important. The investigation calls into question the true effectiveness of US blockades and regulations. Using intermediaries in other countries, Chinese companies can manage to circumvent the restrictions and access the most powerful chips, all without violating the restrictions. Cracks. According to the Trump administration’s controls, the deal is legal as long as INF Tech does not use the chips to help the government with military intelligence applications or to develop weapons. However, it is difficult to know what it is actually being used for and in fact in the US there are suspicions that The Chinese government is leaning on the private sector to improve its military technology. Disagreement. If there is a crack, the logical thing would be to cover it. The Biden administration tried to tighten these rules to prevent chips from being sold to countries that are not close allies of the United States. This would have prevented the sale to the Indonesian company, but when Trump returned to power he decided not to go ahead with these new rules. Instead of the government controlling it, it should be the companies themselves. Interests. The US blockades seek to take advantage of China in the AI ​​technological race, all for reasons of “national security.” It is contradictory that they leave these cracks open through which these chips end up sneaking in legally. The one who thinks it’s great is NVIDIA. Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, a company spokesperson came out in favor of Trump’s decision, saying that “Biden’s controls cost taxpayers tens of billions, paralyzed innovation and ceded ground to foreign rivals.” Image | NVIDIA, Pexels In Xataka | The Chinese government has taken a definitive step to break NVIDIA’s dominance in China: prioritize “national” chips

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