US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that Nvidia’s advanced Blackwell AI chip will not be available to “other people.”
Nvidia, the world’s most valuable company, dominates the AI chip market.
Questions about whether Trump would allow a version of Blackwell to be shipped to China have been raised since August, when he suggested he might allow a scaled-down version of Nvidia’s advanced next-generation GPU chip to be sold in China.
However, Trump’s comments to reporters aboard Air Force One suggest that his administration may not be inclined to grant widespread overseas access to the precious chip.
“The new Blackwell that just came out is 10 years ahead of every other chip,” Trump said as he headed to Washington after spending the weekend in Florida. He added: “But no, we do not give this chip to other people.”
The prospect of selling Blackwell chips to Chinese companies has drawn criticism from China hawks in Washington, who fear the technology will enhance China’s military capabilities and accelerate the development of its artificial intelligence. Republican Congressman John Moolenaar, who chairs the House Select Committee on China, said such a move “would be tantamount to giving Iran weapons-grade uranium.”
Trump had hinted that he might discuss chips with Chinese President Xi Jinping before their summit in South Korea last week, but ultimately said the topic had not been raised.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said last week that Nvidia had not sought U.S. export licenses for the Chinese market because of Beijing’s stance on the company.
“They’ve made it very clear that they don’t want Nvidia to be there right now,” he said during a developer event, adding that it needs access to China to fund U.S. R&D.
Nvidia said Friday it will supply more than 260,000 Blackwell AI chips to South Korea and some of the country’s largest companies, including Samsung Electronics.
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