US to impose new sanctions on AI chip sales to China

The US is looking to impose new sanctions on the AI chip transfer and related semiconductors exported to China, according to a new report from Reuters.

The Biden government is planning to take action in order to prevent American chipmakers from selling semiconductors to China that were not a part of the US sanctions previously. The new restrictions are more aimed at AI chip exports from companies such as Nvidia.

The new rules will block some AI chips that fall just under current technical parameters while demanding companies report shipments of others. This is a new step that is likely to fuel the tech war between the two largest economies.

It’s said that the latest export curbs to keep U.S. chips and equipment from strengthening China’s military. Beijing has accused the US of abusing export controls to suppress Chinese companies.

Last year, the US also halted Nvidia from shipping some of its most advanced AI chipsets to Chinese customers, which is essential to developing chatbots and AI systems.

Later on, Nvidia released new variants of the AI chipsets specifically for the Chinese market and went around the US sanctions guidelines.

One, named the H800, has as much computing power in some settings used in AI work as the company’s more powerful but blocked H100 chip. Still, some key performance aspects are limited, according to a specification sheet.

In that case, the U.S. now plans to introduce new guidelines for AI chips that will restrict certain advanced data center AI chips that are not currently under the sanctioned parameters. To confirm, the new US sanctions will not cover consumer devices such as laptops but companies will need to verify all exports before they are shipped to other countries.

There are several parameters that the US comes up with in order to put new sanctions on AI chip export to China but specific details and timeline to apply such curbs remain internal at the moment.

(source)