How much is national security worth? For the US, one answer is — apparently — a maximum of $7.5bn. That, at least, is what Nvidia and AMD may end up paying the US government, in return for being allowed to restart sales of their artificial intelligence chips to China.
The numbers at stake are surprisingly small. According to President Donald Trump’s latest deal, Nvidia and AMD can restart sales of — respectively — their H20 and MI308 chips to China in return for handing 15 per cent of revenues gleaned to the US government. China’s AI accelerator market, which these chips serve, could grow to $50bn, Nvidia’s chief Jensen Huang reckons. That sounds modest given the global market is expected to be more than 10 times that come 2030, and it will also be shared with local players. Even assuming it was entirely US dominated, that would only imply a $7.5bn take for government coffers; based on likely Nvidia and AMD sales, it is more like half that.
There is debate over the extent to which these chips pose security concerns. The H20 chip, designed specifically for China, is pretty constrained. But either way, this is a levy worth the price for the companies concerned. It enables them to shift piles of stock. Nvidia took a $4.5bn writedown on excess H20 inventory in the first quarter, following the US government’s April 9 ban on exports.