Tencent, Alibaba Ramp Up China AI Chips as Nvidia H200 Return Remains Unclear

6 articles · Updated · CNBC · May 14

Tencent said China-designed GPU supply should rise progressively through 2026, backing a substantial capex increase in the second half as more domestic chips become available month by month.
Alibaba said its T-Head proprietary GPU chips have reached scaled mass production, giving its cloud business a compute-scarcity advantage and opening the door to selling chip-equipped servers or co-building data centers.
Those plans reflect Beijing's self-sufficiency drive after U.S. export curbs cut off Nvidia's advanced chips, pushing local players such as Huawei, Moore Threads and MetaX to fill the gap.
Reuters reported the U.S. had cleared several Chinese firms, including Tencent and Alibaba, to buy Nvidia H200 chips, but no H200s have been made yet and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the report was news to him.
Analysts say Chinese hyperscalers still need top-end chips for agentic AI and large-scale inference, making a hybrid setup of domestic processors and any available Nvidia supply the likeliest near-term path.

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