ByteDance, Alibaba, Tencent place over US$35 bn worth of Nvidia chip orders

ByteDance Ltd (字節跳動), Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (阿里巴巴) and Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊) have ordered more than 3 million of Nvidia Corp’s new RTX PRO 5500 graphics cards with a collective sticker price of over US$35 billion, two people familiar with the matter said, in a rush for a less powerful but export-compliant chip amid US restrictions on trade with China.

US-based chipmaker Nvidia has told customers and partners it cannot guarantee that it can fill the orders because demand from Chinese technology companies far exceeds planned production, the two sources and a third person familiar with the matter said. They requested anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media.

The RTX PRO 5500 is a workstation chip, designed for powerful professional computers rather than the large data center clusters that use Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) processors. But it is among the most powerful Nvidia chips that are still available to Chinese buyers.

Nvidia Corp’s logo and a keyboard are displayed in this illustration taken on Monday.

Photo: Reuters

Nvidia’s Blackwell-based B300 data center chip is not allowed to be sold to Chinese buyers under US export controls, while exports of its Hopper-based H200 are reviewed on a case-by-case basis and are subject to licensing conditions.

One source said Nvidia told partners they might receive only 5 percent to 10 percent of the quantities requested. Another said the company had indicated it could produce no more than 3 million RTX PRO 5500 cards globally next year. Total orders from customers in China have exceeded 6 million, two of the sources said.

The three Chinese tech giants’ orders are for cards priced at about US$11,400 each, two of the sources said, giving them a potential combined value of more than US$35 billion.

The scale of the orders, which have not been previously reported, underscores the ongoing appetite among Chinese companies for Nvidia hardware despite the US curbs.

Nvidia chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) has said the restrictions reduced Nvidia’s share of China’s AI data center chip market from a near monopoly to effectively nothing. But demand for the RTX PRO 5500 suggests Nvidia retains a sizeable potential market in China through less powerful products that may still be available.

The surge in demand also highlights how US restrictions have tightened computing power supplies in the world’s second-largest economy as Chinese companies race to develop cutting-edge AI models and propel Beijing’s effort to deploy the technology across its industries.

Washington’s curbs have pushed Chinese firms toward domestic suppliers, while Beijing has encouraged the use of homegrown chips.

Huawei, in particular, has gained market share, though Chinese chipmakers have generally struggled to match leading American products, partly because separate restrictions have limited access to the foreign equipment that is used to make the most advanced semiconductors.

An Nvidia spokesperson said Chinese producers of workstation chips and cards have experienced "unprecedented growth since 2022," when the curbs were first imposed.

"US firms continue to be restricted by a combination of outdated US export controls, which cover gaming products released nearly a half a decade ago, and China’s own limit on US imports," the spokesperson said.

ByteDance, Alibaba and Tencent did not respond to requests for comment.

Starting next year, Nvidia is expected to devote much of its capacity at Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to Rubin, its next-generation platform for large-scale data centres, rather than products like the RTX PRO 5500, two of the sources said. TSMC declined to comment.

Nvidia has told customers to expect early samples in December, with commercial deliveries beginning in the first quarter of next year, they added.