Financial Times: A small amount of Huida H200 chips are allowed to enter China, and Beijing plans to support local industries

(Central News Agency, London, comprehensive foreign news report on the 18th) The British "Financial Times" reported that a small amount of Nvidia H200 chips have been allowed to enter mainland China. At the same time, the Beijing authorities are trying to help China's major artificial intelligence (AI) companies to catch up with American competitors.

Two people familiar with the matter said that ByteDance and Tencent each received about 10,000 H200 processors in recent weeks, and several other Chinese technology companies may soon be approved to obtain chips of similar size.

H200 is at least two generations behind Huida's most advanced chips. Due to US export controls, Chinese customers are unable to purchase Huida's more advanced chips.

One of the people familiar with the matter said that although the United States has approved Chinese companies to purchase up to 100,000 H200 chips each, Beijing hopes that these companies will keep most of the H200 abroad to support China's local chip manufacturers.

In addition to a small number of H200 chips that are allowed to enter mainland China, Chinese regulatory agencies have also informed relevant companies that such chips can be shipped to Hong Kong and used there. The license issued by the United States allows Huida H200 chips to be shipped to mainland China and Hong Kong.

However, getting chips into Hong Kong remains a challenge for Chinese technology companies, as the city lacks enough data centers to house them and power supply constraints are unlikely to improve in the short term.

"This is a dilemma. Everyone needs these chips, but they can't find a way to use them in Hong Kong... I hope the relevant controls can be gradually relaxed," a person familiar with the matter said.

Multiple people familiar with the matter pointed out that Huida still has about 500,000 H200 chips in stock, mainly supplying Chinese customers, but sales have been hampered by Beijing's restrictions.

A person familiar with the matter said that some Huida partners, including Lenovo, notified Chinese customers last week that they can resume ordering products equipped with H200 chips. These companies will integrate Huida chips with central processing units (CPUs) and other network equipment, and then sell them as AI servers.

However, relevant procurement still requires individual approval through an application process and is overseen by China's National Development and Reform Commission.

The report pointed out that China’s lack of the most advanced chip manufacturing equipment will limit its ability to meet the surge in domestic demand in the short term, which means that China must still import some Huida chips, especially for AI training.

Chinese regulators have recently begun relaxing restrictions on U.S. chip imports to ensure major AI developers can continue to train advanced models, people familiar with the matter said. Chinese companies are scrambling to catch up with advanced models like Anthropic’s Mythos 5.