Nvidia says H20 export controls didn’t stop China’s AI progress — claims 'they only stifled U.S. economic and technology leadership'

Sunday, August 17, 2025

Nvidia shared an opinion piece by Aaron Ginn, co-founder of AI company Hydra Host, stating that despite the U.S.'s export controls on Nvidia's H20 chips, China continued to achieve AI breakthroughs. Nvidia shared Ginn's thoughts on the matter on X, saying that Washington's bans only held it back from expanding its influence.

"H20 export controls didn't slow China — they only stifled U.S. economic and technology leadership," Nvidia said on the social media platform. "For the U.S. to win the AI race, America's full-stack platform must remain the global standard." It then linked to Ginn's op-ed in the Wall Street Journal.

Ginn argues in his commentary that "doubling down on failed GPU export controls falls apart under scrutiny and real-world conditions." He first points out that despite the White House banning the export of H20 chips from April to July this ye ar, China continued making advancements in AI technologies. Furthermore, it's been proven that demand for these advanced semiconductors is so high that Chinese companies have smuggled a billion dollars' worth of Nvidia AI GPUs in just the past three months alone.

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While Nvidia's high-end chips are indeed crucial for delivering the performance needed to run, the Hydra Host co-founder says that the company's CUDA platform — which includes programming models and AI toolkits — is far more important and cannot be easily replicated by its Chinese competitors. He even criticized former President Biden's AI diffusion rule, saying that it lumped together advanced nations like Portugal and Switzerland with countries in turmoil, such as Yemen and Ukraine. Nvidia has also previously criticized this plan, warning that it could backfire against the United States, as it would allow non-American companies to set the global standards for AI technology.

This opinion is pretty much in line with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's stance on export control — that it was a failure — and that the U.S. should go beyond preventing its rivals from acquiring its technologies to stay ahead in the AI race. However, other experts argue that the AI ban should remain, as it is a requirement to complement Washington's strategy of building the most powerful AI chips in America.

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