Huawei asks customers to source memory for its AI chips
What happened
Huawei has told some customers to source the memory needed for its AI chips themselves because it cannot obtain enough, effectively pushing buyers to the black market, The Information reported. The report said Huawei plans to launch Ascend 960DT early next year with double the performance, but Chinese suppliers lack HBM capacity, and US export rules bar it from buying directly from Samsung and SK Hynix, which together hold more than 80% of the global market. So far the situation rests on customers being asked to sort out memory procurement themselves, and Huawei has not responded to the report.
Written by AI from the reports · updated 3 h ago
Timeline
Follow the reports to see the event from each side.
- The DecoderHuawei tells customers to find their own AI chip memory, effectively outsourcing procurement to the black market
Huawei is telling customers to source the high-performance memory for its AI chips on their own, pushing them onto the black market. Smugglers are exploiting a loophole in U.S. export rules by bundling HBM with low-end processors, shipping them through Hong Kong, and separating the chips on site.
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