(Yicai) July 17 -- On a third trip to China this year, Nvidia founder Jensen Huang praised the country's artificial intelligence pioneers while positioning the US chip giant as a partner rather than a competitor in the world's second-largest economy.

His comments come as California-based Nvidia navigates the increasingly complex China-US trade relationship, while seeking to maintain its foothold in the crucial Chinese market. That was perhaps made a little easier two days ago when the United States cleared Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices to restart exports of artificial intelligence chips to China.

“I'm not balancing anything," Huang said when asked during a 90-minute press conference at a Beijing hotel yesterday how he maintains an equilibrium between the US and Chinese governments. “I need to have a good relationship with the US government. I need to have a good relationship with the Chinese government.

“I have great relationships with just about every government,” he pointed out.

Nvidia has the role of an educator rather than a policy advocate, said Huang, who is also the company’s chief executive. “It is our job only to inform the governments of the nature and the unintended consequences of the policies that they make. We can only influence them, inform them, do our best to provide them with facts.”

Praise for Chinese Rivals

Huang praised China's development, singling out Huawei Technologies, one of Nvidia's biggest rivals in the AI chip domain. "Anyone who discounts Huawei, and anyone who discounts China's manufacturing capability, is deeply naive," he said.

“This is a formidable company, and I've seen the technologies they've created in the past," he noted, asking if there is any business that builds more advanced phones and better cellular telecoms technology worldwide.

When pressed about whether Huawei's AI chips could eventually replace Nvidia's products for large language model training, Huang said “that's just a matter of time.

“I've been doing this for 30 years, they've been doing it for a few,” he said. “However, the fact that they're already on the dance floor kind of tells you something about how formidable they are.”

China's broader AI innovation ecosystem is also admirable, Huang noted. The country has undergone a remarkable market transformation since the early days of Nvidia (founded in 1993), when major Chinese tech giants, including Baidu, Alibaba Group Holding, Tencent Holdings, and Xiaomi, were yet to be established, he said.

Nvidia’s early presence allowed it to build partnerships with these companies from their inception, Huang pointed out, adding that China has emerged as a global AI powerhouse, advancing at "incredible speed" across infrastructure, models, and applications.

Huang highlighted Chinese model innovations, using DeepSeek-V3 and R1, Alibaba's Qianwen, and MoonShot AI's Kimi as examples of the "excellent technology" emerging from China's AI laboratories. The R1 is "revolutionary" and has been widely adopted from healthcare to robotics, he pointed out.

On the topic of China's open-source AI initiatives, Huang said "the openness made it possible for every industry in every country to engage AI. AI is not for just a few people or a few countries. AI is for everyone.”

China’s fiercely competitive business landscape is particularly impressive, he said, adding that it drives the creation of standout companies and pioneering businesses, which sparks an explosion of innovative features and capabilities.

Huang also praised China's achievements beyond AI, particularly highlighting the country's electric vehicle industry. He noted that over the past five years, Chinese EVs have perhaps been the most surprising presence in the world.

Huang said he would love to buy a car from Xiaomi, with which Nvidia has developed deep ties, but the Beijing-based company’s EVs are not yet available in the United States.

Praise for China's Supply Chain 

Though most of Nvidia's manufacturing is not done in the Chinese mainland, Huang highlighted the critical importance of the country’s supply chain to the global tech industry.

"Batteries are hard. Solar panels are hard. Electric vehicles are increasingly hard. Cell phones are very difficult to manufacture outside of China," Huang noted. "The supply chain here in China is very advanced, especially for a very high volume, consumer-oriented, very delicate manufacturing," he said, adding that the country is indispensable for precision manufacturing in the global tech ecosystem.

China is an innovation powerhouse beyond hardware, excelling in creating new applications, Huang pointed out, highlighting its unique digital platforms and the influence on global internet usage patterns of Chinese apps such as Xiaohongshu (Rednote) and TikTok.

There is a digital divide between China and the United States, with the Asian country having advanced mobile payment and digital financial systems, according to Huang. "None of you have wallets and cash and credit cards anymore,” he said. “I still use money!

"When you see me in the United States, you must think you went back in time," he added. “You wouldn't even understand my life. It's too strange. It's too mechanical. I'm like an antique.”

AI Chip Sales Restart

On July 14, Nvidia said it was filing applications to begin selling its H20 AI chips in China again after the US government assured the California-based company that export licenses would be granted, It hopes to start deliveries soon.

On Nvidia's market re-entry strategy, Huang said he has not yet met with any customers because the company must first reboot its supply chain. "The first unknown is when will the customers give us new orders. And then number two, I have to restart my supply chain,” he said. “Starting up a supply chain is not instant.”

Nvidia launched the H20 chips, designed specifically for the Chinese market, in 2023 after the US government banned the firm from selling its more advanced chips, including the H100 and A100, to China. President Donald Trump expanded the ban to more products this April, including the H20 chips, amid a trade spat between the two countries.

The H20 "is not our best product," Huang said, but expressed confidence in its capabilities, particularly for innovative architectures such as DeepSeek's AI models. "I hope to get more advanced chips into China than the H20," he added.

After Nvidia recently became the world's first company to have a market capitalization of more than USD4 trillion, Huang said that he is "the only CEO in the world that has ever enjoyed the least valuable technology company in the world, and now the most valuable technology company in the world.

"Competitors all over the world, they're all working very hard. They want to win," Huang noted. “They're not my enemies. Many are my friends. And they want to win, and I want to win. That's why they call it competitive spirit. We can make each other better.”

‘Growth Only Beginning, Not Ending

Despite the challenges, Nvidia will continue to expand in the Chinese market, with the company having grown "quite a bit" in the last several years, Huang said. "I hope that growth is only beginning, not ending," he noted, adding that the firm plans to hire more of the country's "extraordinary engineers and professionals.”

Huang was invited to China this time to deliver a keynote address at the China International Supply Chain Expo in Beijing yesterday. At the event, Nvidia showcased its partnerships with Chinese robotics companies, with the sector emerging as a new area of interest. AI-powered robots could help address global labor shortages while lowering costs and boosting productivity, according to Huang.

Asked if he would visit China again sometime this year, Huang left the door open, saying “I hope so. You have to invite me!”

Editor: Martin Kadiev