Nvidia’s Jensen Huang praises China’s AI talent, warns US against restrictive chip rules
Nvidia’s chief says the AI race needs fewer barriers, not more, as Chinese researchers and companies raise the global stakes.
- May 20, 2025,
- Updated May 20, 2025 9:06 AM IST
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has made a striking call for open competition in artificial intelligence, insisting that some of the world’s most exceptional AI researchers hail from China and that US companies should be embracing, not limiting, this global expertise.
Speaking with Ben Thompson of Stratechery, Huang rejected any narrow categorisation of talent. “The researchers, the AI scientists in China, they’re world-class. These are not Chinese AI researchers, they’re world-class AI researchers,” he said. “You walk up and down the aisles of Anthropic or OpenAI or DeepMind, there’s a whole bunch of AI researchers there, and they’re from China. Of course, it’s sensible, and they’re extraordinary, and so the fact that they do extraordinary work is not surprising to me.”
Huang went on to single out China’s progress in AI, highlighting emerging models from companies such as DeepSeek and Manus as strong contenders to American-developed systems. “Let’s face it, DeepSeek is deeply excellent work,” Huang said, adding that failing to recognise this achievement would signal “a lack of confidence so deep that I just can’t even tolerate it.”
For Huang, healthy rivalry between nations is not just inevitable but essential to the sector’s advancement. “Everybody loves competition. Companies need competition to inspire themselves, nations need that, and there’s no question we spur them,” he said. He further described Huawei as “a formidable company… a world-class technology company.”
But Huang also issued a warning. He argued that overly restrictive US regulations—especially the now-rescinded “Diffusion rule,” which sought to restrict AI chip exports—could cripple America’s ability to stay competitive at a pivotal moment. “You can’t just say, ‘Let’s go write a diffusion rule, protect one layer at the expense of everything else.’ It’s nonsensical,” he said. “The idea that we would limit American AI technology right at the time when international competitors have caught up, and we pretty much predicted it.”
He welcomed the White House’s decision on 12 May to scrap the rule, saying, “The idea of AI diffusion limiting other countries’ access to American technology is a mission expressed exactly wrong. It should be about accelerating the adoption of American technology everywhere before it’s too late.”
Huang stressed that the US should be fighting for its place in China’s huge developer market. “The idea that we would have America not compete in the Chinese market, where 50% of the developers are, makes absolutely no sense from a computing infrastructure, computing architectural perspective,” he said. “We ought to go and give American companies the opportunity to compete in China, offset the trade deficit, generate tax income for the American people, build, hire jobs, create more jobs.”
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Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has made a striking call for open competition in artificial intelligence, insisting that some of the world’s most exceptional AI researchers hail from China and that US companies should be embracing, not limiting, this global expertise.
Speaking with Ben Thompson of Stratechery, Huang rejected any narrow categorisation of talent. “The researchers, the AI scientists in China, they’re world-class. These are not Chinese AI researchers, they’re world-class AI researchers,” he said. “You walk up and down the aisles of Anthropic or OpenAI or DeepMind, there’s a whole bunch of AI researchers there, and they’re from China. Of course, it’s sensible, and they’re extraordinary, and so the fact that they do extraordinary work is not surprising to me.”
Huang went on to single out China’s progress in AI, highlighting emerging models from companies such as DeepSeek and Manus as strong contenders to American-developed systems. “Let’s face it, DeepSeek is deeply excellent work,” Huang said, adding that failing to recognise this achievement would signal “a lack of confidence so deep that I just can’t even tolerate it.”
For Huang, healthy rivalry between nations is not just inevitable but essential to the sector’s advancement. “Everybody loves competition. Companies need competition to inspire themselves, nations need that, and there’s no question we spur them,” he said. He further described Huawei as “a formidable company… a world-class technology company.”
But Huang also issued a warning. He argued that overly restrictive US regulations—especially the now-rescinded “Diffusion rule,” which sought to restrict AI chip exports—could cripple America’s ability to stay competitive at a pivotal moment. “You can’t just say, ‘Let’s go write a diffusion rule, protect one layer at the expense of everything else.’ It’s nonsensical,” he said. “The idea that we would limit American AI technology right at the time when international competitors have caught up, and we pretty much predicted it.”
He welcomed the White House’s decision on 12 May to scrap the rule, saying, “The idea of AI diffusion limiting other countries’ access to American technology is a mission expressed exactly wrong. It should be about accelerating the adoption of American technology everywhere before it’s too late.”
Huang stressed that the US should be fighting for its place in China’s huge developer market. “The idea that we would have America not compete in the Chinese market, where 50% of the developers are, makes absolutely no sense from a computing infrastructure, computing architectural perspective,” he said. “We ought to go and give American companies the opportunity to compete in China, offset the trade deficit, generate tax income for the American people, build, hire jobs, create more jobs.”
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