Malaysia is considering using Huawei chips to power its sovereign AI efforts, Bloomberg reported, in what would be the first known instance of a foreign government choosing Chinese accelerators over American ones.
Though Washington has warned that using Chinese chips could violate export restrictions, Huawei’s steep discounts offer cheaper compute amid a global memory shortage that could persist through 2030.
Beijing’s inroads into Malaysia, which already hosts US data centers, boost its efforts to become a global AI supplier of choice, as the West tightens China’s access to advanced chips: In May, Belgium arrested a Chinese citizen suspected of stealing chip technology, while a Chinese tech firm, blacklisted by the US, reportedly exploited loopholes to ship Nvidia chips to China’s AI companies.