Some of NVIDIA’s high-performance products cannot be sold to the Chinese market
The U.S. government has recently revised its technology export bans, resulting in certain artificial intelligence chip products from NVIDIA being prohibited from entering the Chinese market. This includes the A800 and H800 GPU products, which were previously modified to comply with regulations, now finding themselves on the restricted export list.
U.S. Secretary of Commerce, Gina Raimondo, articulated that this move aims to address the export restrictions’ shortcomings from last October. The primary intent is to thwart the Chinese government from harnessing cutting-edge chips for military advancement. The U.S. may adopt a strategy of refining these regulations at least annually, ensuring that the Chinese government cannot exploit policy loopholes to access advanced American chip technology.
Raimondo emphasized that the U.S. does not target to jeopardize China’s economy. Hence, the current restrictions do not encompass chips used in laptops, smartphones, or gaming—a majority of consumer-grade chips. However, the export of certain chip products will still necessitate U.S. government authorization.
Although the GeForce RTX 4090 falls under consumer-grade chip products, due to its computational power surpassing U.S. specified standards, it remains on the prohibited export list. Additionally, chips designed for commercial applications, such as A100, A800, H800, H100, and L40S, are now marked as restricted exports.
Beyond China, the revised provisions also extend the advanced chip export ban to over 40 countries and regions. This is to prevent banned chip products from being rerouted to China through these territories. Simultaneously, the U.S. government has instituted restrictions for 21 countries outside of China, mandating approvals to acquire advanced chip manufacturing tools. This further curtails the potential for Chinese firms to obtain such tools through alternate channels, subsequently restricting their ability to independently develop advanced process chip products.
