It has been reported that the Chinese Vice Premier stated that 'those who refuse to adopt Chinese-made AI chips are traitors.'

In China, a project to develop domestically produced AI chips is underway in an effort to advance AI development without relying on American companies. Amidst this, it has been reported that Chinese Vice Premier Ding Xuexiang previously stated that 'those who refuse to adopt Chinese-made AI chips are traitors.'

Inside China's All-Out Push to Catch Up With American AI Chips - WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/world/china/china-ai-chips-race-949050d0

AI research and development is thriving in China, with companies such as Alibaba, DeepSeek, and Z.ai successively releasing high-performance AI models. Chinese-made models boast performance comparable to those of leading American companies like OpenAI and Anthropic, and Moonshot AI's ' Kimi K3, ' released on July 17, 2026, has shown scores exceeding Claude Fable 5 in some tests.

Chinese-made AI models are cheaper than American-made models, and many of them are freely available, leading to their use worldwide. However, China has banned the import of NVIDIA's high-performance AI chips, resulting in a shortage of computing resources for both AI training and service deployment. Kimi K3, for example, had to temporarily suspend new subscription contracts just two days after its release.

Kimi K3, a Chinese AI with performance comparable to Claude Fable 5, has become so popular that it has run out of GPUs, forcing a temporary suspension of new subscriptions. Some are saying this is 'better than Anthropic's response' - GIGAZINE

In China, efforts are underway to produce AI chips domestically without relying on NVIDIA. Huawei, one of China's leading technology companies, is developing an AI chip under the brand name 'Ascend,' and in June 2026, it was reported that they had successfully performed post-training of DeepSeek-V4-Pro using the Ascend 910C. If the development of the Ascend series proceeds smoothly, it is attracting attention as it could create an ecosystem where AI can be developed and operated solely within China's domestic supply chain, without relying on NVIDIA.

Post-training of DeepSeek-V4-Pro successfully achieved using Huawei's cutting-edge 'Ascend 910C' chip, not NVIDIA's, advancing China's AI independence - GIGAZINE

China's AI chip development project is being led by the Central Commission for Science and Technology, headed by Vice Premier Ding Xuexiang. According to a Wall Street Journal report, Huawei invited Ding to a private briefing in the summer of 2025, where he explained that 'China will achieve self-sufficiency in the field of AI within three years.' This explanation led Ding to adopt a more proactive stance towards AI chip production, and he went so far as to warn domestic AI companies that 'those who refuse to adopt Chinese-made AI chips are traitors.'

The US government has already approved the export of NVIDIA H200 to China , and is awaiting import permission from the Chinese government. It has been reported that on July 8, 2026, 'the Chinese government is expected to grant import permission for H200 to Alibaba, ByteDance, and DeepSeek.'

China to approve imports of NVIDIA H200 by domestic AI companies - GIGAZINE