Huawei rejects notion that advanced chip shortage will hinder China's AI ambitions

A top executive at Chinese tech giant Huawei (HWT.UL) on Thursday dismissed the idea that a shortage of the most advanced artificial intelligence chips will prevent the country from achieving AI leadership, but said innovation is needed to address the problem.

A top executive at Chinese tech giant Huawei (HWT.UL) on Thursday dismissed the idea that a shortage of the most advanced artificial intelligence chips will prevent the country from achieving AI leadership, but said innovation is needed to address the problem.

The comments by Zhang Ping'an, CEO of Huawei Cloud, come amid tighter U.S. restrictions on shipments of advanced AI chips to China, including a ban on sales by companies such as U.S. chip giant Nvidia (NVDA.O).

"No one will deny that we are facing limited computing capacity in China... But we cannot rely solely on having AI chips with the most advanced manufacturing process nodes as the ultimate foundation for AI infrastructure," Zhang told a forum during the World AI Conference in Shanghai, a three-day event that began Thursday.

Huawei asserted that the shortage of advanced chips will not impede China's ambitions in AI. The company emphasized the need for innovation in computing architecture and highlighted the role of cloud solutions in overcoming these limitations.

"If we believe that not having the most advanced AI chips means we won't be able to lead in AI, then we need to abandon this view," Zhang added. Huawei, which has been placed on the U.S. Entity List preventing it from buying advanced chips from U.S. companies, has developed its own AI chip product called Ascend, which is now used by many companies in China to train AI models.

However, the Ascend AI chip, along with many others from Chinese companies, is considered significantly inferior in terms of compute capability compared to Nvidia's offerings. Zhang called for innovative approaches that put more emphasis on the cloud, which he said can help compensate for the lack of advanced AI chips through innovation in compute architecture.

He also said that a converged approach is needed to combine cloud, edge and networks in ways that can reduce power consumption and improve overall efficiency. Zhang noted that Huawei Cloud is among the leaders in providing such innovative solutions.

Collaboration: Grupo Auge | Reuters (International).