Nvidia’s Huang warns US to “run fast” as China advances in AI

• Huang said Nvidia can’t sell AI chips to China due to US export rules.
• He warned the US must “run fast” to stay ahead in AI.

Nvidia’s Jensen Huang said demand for the company’s Blackwell chips remains “very strong,” with its orders for wafers from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) continuing to climb, as reported by Reuters.

Speaking at an event hosted by TSMC in Hsinchu, Taiwan, Huang explained that the Blackwell platform involves more than just graphics processors. “Nvidia builds the GPU, but we also build the CPU, the networking, the switches, and so there are a lot of chips associated with Blackwell,” he told reporters.

TSMC CEO C.C. Wei declined to share how many wafers Nvidia had requested, saying only that the number was confidential. “TSMC is doing a very good job supporting us on wafers,” Huang said, adding that Nvidia’s success would not have been possible without its Taiwanese manufacturing partner.

Huang’s visit marked his fourth trip to Taiwan this year, underscoring Nvidia’s close relationship with TSMC, which manufactures most of its advanced chips. The collaboration has been central to Nvidia’s rise as one of the most valuable companies in the world. In October, Nvidia became the first to reach a $5 trillion market capitalisation — a milestone that led Wei to call Huang a “five-trillion-dollar man.”

Strong demand and tight supply

Huang acknowledged that Nvidia’s rapid growth has created supply pressures. Asked about possible memory shortages, he said there would likely be constraints in different parts of the supply chain. “We have three very, very good memory makers — SK Hynix, Samsung, Micron — all incredibly good memory makers, and they have scaled up tremendous capacity to support us,” he said.

According to Huang, Nvidia has already received the most advanced chip samples from all three companies. On the question of whether memory prices could rise, he said: “It’s for them to decide how to run their business.”

The global chip industry has been heating up as demand for AI-related hardware surges. SK Hynix recently said it had sold out all of its 2026 production capacity and would sharply increase investment, anticipating a long “super cycle” driven by AI systems. Samsung Electronics also said it was in close talks with Nvidia to supply its next-generation high-bandwidth memory, known as HBM4.

No Blackwell shipments to China

Huang also addressed ongoing questions about whether Nvidia would sell its Blackwell chips — the company’s most advanced AI processors — to China. “Currently, we are not planning to ship anything to China,” he said during his stop in Tainan, another city in Taiwan. “It’s up to China when they would like Nvidia products to go back to serve the Chinese market. I look forward to them changing their policy.”

The Trump administration has banned the sale of high-end AI chips like Blackwell to China, arguing that they could help strengthen China’s military and AI capabilities. Some analysts had speculated that talks between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea might lead to a deal allowing a downgraded version of Blackwell to be sold in China. So far, no such agreement has emerged.

The US has permitted Nvidia to sell a less powerful H20 chip in China, but Huang has said several times that Chinese buyers have shown little interest. “China does not want Nvidia in the country,” he told reporters earlier this month, noting that the company’s market share for advanced AI chips in China remains at zero.

Partnership and global competition

Huang said he was in Taiwan to spend a day and a half visiting TSMC and attending the chipmaker’s sports day. “Business is very strong,” he said. “So I came back to encourage my TSMC friends.”

When asked about Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s idea to build a semiconductor fabrication plant, Huang said such an effort would be extremely difficult. “Building advanced semiconductor manufacturing capabilities like TSMC does is very hard,” he said. “But it’s a very important technology and the demand is extremely high.”

Huang also clarified comments that had been widely quoted by media suggesting he had said China would win the race in artificial intelligence. “That’s not what I said,” he explained. “What I said was that China has very good AI technology. They have many AI researchers.”

He added that roughly half of the world’s AI researchers are based in China and that many of the most popular open-source AI models come from there. “So they’re moving very, very fast,” he said. “The United States has to continue to move incredibly fast; otherwise, the world is very competitive, so we have to run fast.”

Huang’s comments highlight both Nvidia’s dominant position in the global AI chip market and the growing challenges it faces. The company’s dependence on TSMC for production, the tight supply of memory components, and restrictions on exports to China have all added complexity to its operations.

Even so, Nvidia remains at the centre of the AI boom, with demand for its processors outpacing supply and pushing its valuation to new heights. As governments tighten controls and competition from Asia intensifies, Huang’s message was clear: staying ahead in AI means moving fast — and working closely with partners like TSMC.

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