According to informants, Biden administration officials have been discussing: restricting Nvidia and other American companies from selling advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chips to "certain countries" to limit their AI development and capabilities.

According to their statement, for the so-called "national security interests," the new regulations will set upper limits on export permits to certain countries. Informants said officials will focus on countries in the Persian Gulf, where the demand for AI data centers is growing and there is ample financial resources. However, the evaluation work is still in the early stages and there may be variables.

Persian Gulf countries should include eight countries along the Persian Gulf coast: Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, and Oman.

Informants also pointed out that this idea has gained attention in recent weeks. The policy will be based on a new framework to simplify the licensing process for shipping AI chips to data centers in the UAE and Saudi Arabia, among other places.

Nvidia, AMD, Intel, and other companies have not commented on this. Currently, it is unclear how each AI chip manufacturer will respond to the U.S. restrictions. Reports suggest that it may be difficult to introduce comprehensive new policies in the final months of the Biden administration, and enforcing such rules could be challenging.

A spokesman for the White House National Security Council declined to comment on the above discussions, but mentioned a recent joint statement on artificial intelligence made by the United States and the UAE. In this statement, both countries acknowledge the "enormous potential of artificial intelligence," as well as the "challenges and risks of this emerging technology, and the vital importance of safeguard measures."

Hidden dangers

However, given the actions of the USA in the past, this move is inevitably seen as an attempt to further restrict China's development in the field of AI. It has been reported that prior to this, the USA had already restricted companies like nvidia and AMD from exporting AI chips to over 40 countries in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia, out of concerns that these companies' products might end up in China.

Previously, nvidia had developed custom chips from the H20 series for the Chinese market in accordance with US export regulations and began accepting orders in February this year. However, due to performance downgrades and high prices, it did not generate much interest among Chinese customers, who instead turned more to choosing domestically produced AI chips.

nvidia CEO Jensen Huang previously stated that governments worldwide are seeking the so-called sovereignty AI - the ability to establish and operate their own AI systems, which has become a key driving factor for advanced processor demand. nvidia's chips are the gold standard for datacenter operators, making the company the most valuable chip manufacturer globally and the biggest beneficiary of the AI boom.

Regarding the unreasonable suppression by the USA, a spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Commerce responded, "For some time, the USA has frequently generalized the concept of national security, abused export control measures, artificially divided the global semiconductor market, wantonly interfered with normal economic and trade exchanges between enterprises in other countries, seriously deviated from the principles of free trade and multilateral trading rules, and severely disrupted the stability of the global industry chain and supply chain."

"China has consistently and resolutely opposed this. We hope that relevant countries will adhere to market principles and the spirit of contracts, resist the economic coercion practices of the United States, and jointly maintain the stability of the global industry chain and supply chain." he added.