BEIJING: A Chinese university with close ties to the country’s defence bodies recently bought advanced AI chips made by tech giant Nvidia, procurement notices show, despite stringent US controls.
China and the United States are locked in a fierce competition for supremacy in the strategic and rapidly growing field of artificial intelligence, and Nvidia’s market-leading products have become a major point of contention.
The findings come as the California-based firm is embroiled in crisis following revelations that co-founder and CEO Jensen Huang may have been caught up in a Chinese espionage operation, sending its shares tumbling.
Northwestern Polytechnical University in the city of Xi’an purchased two Nvidia H200 chips from Shaanxi Bosuan Network Technology – not Nvidia directly – for 874,700 yuan (US$131,200), according to a procurement notice dated Oct 21.
H200 chips are subject to US export controls that limit direct shipments to China and apply certain restrictions on their resale globally.
The H200 chips were purchased for the management school of NPU, which is one of China’s “Seven Sons of National Defence” universities that conduct defence-related research and maintain links with the country’s military.
The procurement notice seen by AFP was no longer accessible on the school’s website on Thursday.
AFP has contacted the NPU School of Management for comment.
