Chinese tech giant Huawei is preparing to test its most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip to date, the Ascend 910B, in what could mark a major inflection point in the global AI semiconductor race. The move comes despite years of U.S. export restrictions aimed at curbing China's access to cutting-edge chip technology—and is raising concerns among investors about Nvidia’s long-term market dominance.

According to a report by The Wall Street Journal, Huawei is now readying the Ascend 910B as a domestic alternative to Nvidia’s high-end AI chips. The chip is positioned to rival Nvidia’s H100 and A100 offerings, which have become critical components for training and deploying large AI models around the world.

What’s remarkable is how Huawei has managed this progress while still blacklisted by the United States since 2019, which cut it off from crucial components and partnerships. Instead of relying on access to the most advanced chips, Huawei has leaned on system-level design innovation—layering and combining less advanced chips to create powerful, integrated performance.

According to industry research firm SemiAnalysis, Huawei’s solution now outperforms Nvidia in several key metricsinside China, even without the benefit of Western chipmaking infrastructure.

Nvidia’s China Revenues in Decline

This rise in domestic Chinese AI chips is already making waves on Wall Street. Analysts at J.P. Morgan estimate that Nvidia could lose $15 to $16 billion in revenue in 2025 due to mounting U.S. export controls that have sharply limited the company’s ability to sell in China. Once Nvidia's largest overseas customer base, China now accounts for just 13% of its revenue—the lowest in over a decade.

In response to tightened export restrictions, Nvidia has regularly released "watered-down" versions of its chips—such as the A800 and H20—that fall just below U.S. control thresholds. But the U.S. government has continued to adjust its rules to block even these loopholes, leading to increased uncertainty for the company.

Last year, Nvidia was forced to take a $5.5 billion write-down on unsold inventory of chips it could no longer legally ship to China, further underscoring the risks of overreliance on a politically sensitive market.

Huawei’s Growing Domestic Momentum

Meanwhile, Huawei is gaining traction. The company plans to ship up to 800,000 Ascend 910 chips this year to Chinese tech giants, including ByteDance, according to internal projections.

The company’s resurgence in the AI chip space is part of a broader Chinese effort to reduce dependence on Western semiconductor technology, particularly in strategic sectors like artificial intelligence, defense, and infrastructure. Huawei’s designs may not match Nvidia’s latest nodes in raw sophistication, but the combined performance and availability inside China makes them an increasingly viable—and possibly preferred—choice.

Moreover, with the release of DeepSeek V2, a high-performing Chinese large language model that runs efficiently on lower-tier hardware, the need for ultra-premium Nvidia chips could decline inside China, further softening Nvidia’s edge.

Can Huawei Expand Beyond China?

A major open question is whether Huawei’s AI chips will remain confined to domestic use, or if they could begin to displace Nvidia in other markets where governments are neutral or favorable to Beijing.

Commentators say it’s likely that Huawei will begin targeting nearby or non-aligned countries, particularly in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East—regions where Chinese tech already has significant inroads.

If the performance of the Ascend 910B proves reliable in practice, Huawei may pose a serious challenge in those markets as well.

Nvidia’s Strategic Dilemma

As Nvidia continues to innovate, it faces growing pressure to balance two competing realities: adhering to U.S. export restrictions while maintaining global competitiveness. The company’s new Blackwell architecture may offer additional compliance pathways, but industry observers warn that each new workaround only adds to Washington’s regulatory scrutiny.

“There’s a fine line Nvidia is walking,” one analyst noted. “They’re creating alternate chips to keep China revenue flowing—but if those chips are still too powerful, the U.S. government may block them anyway. At some point, that strategy hits a wall.”

With U.S.–China tech tensions showing no signs of easing, and Huawei’s domestic momentum accelerating, the global AI chip landscape is entering a new and more unpredictable phase—one where geopolitical boundaries may increasingly determine technological leadership.