Nvidia's Jensen Huang Says China 'Will Win' AI Race With US (ft.com) 75
Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang has warned that China will beat the US in the AI race, thanks to lower energy costs and looser regulations. From a report: In the starkest comments yet from the head of the world's most valuable company, Huang told the FT: "China is going to win the AI race." Huang's remarks come after the Trump administration maintained a ban on California-based Nvidia selling its most advanced chips to Beijing following a meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping last week.
The Nvidia chief said that the west, including the US and UK, was being held back by "cynicism." "We need more optimism," Huang said on Wednesday on the sidelines of the Financial Times' Future of AI Summit. Huang singled out new rules on AI by US states that could result in "50 new regulations." He contrasted that approach with Chinese energy subsidies that made it more affordable for local tech companies to run Chinese alternatives to Nvidia's AI chips. "Power is free," he said.
The Nvidia chief said that the west, including the US and UK, was being held back by "cynicism." "We need more optimism," Huang said on Wednesday on the sidelines of the Financial Times' Future of AI Summit. Huang singled out new rules on AI by US states that could result in "50 new regulations." He contrasted that approach with Chinese energy subsidies that made it more affordable for local tech companies to run Chinese alternatives to Nvidia's AI chips. "Power is free," he said.
It's a useless technology anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
As for the cool stuff machine learning can do that gets done in public universities on their supercomputers. We don't need thousand acre data centers clogging up our towns and cities. Let China have that nonsense.
None of this is going to generate real GDP gains or better quality of life for the average person. It's just going to exasperate already large problems with our capitalist economies not able to generate enough quality jobs.
We are not ready to dismantle capitalism. And that's all AI is really being used for outside of a handful of the University research projects.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Agree completely, the use of AI in robotics has changed that industry from a bunch of hobby/academic projects into actual factory floor deployments that can pick up and pack 1000 cookies in an hour without making a crumb. (Only nit to pick is that horses were ridden for around a thousand years before saddles were invented, and then another couple thousand until stirrups were added.)
Re:It's a useless technology anyway (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Your post is a lot of nonsense. AI is probably a bubble and driven by the notion that there will be broad productivity across industry that is likely to never materialize, that much is true.
However, there is also the possibility that it will be an inflection point that rapidly advances material science, bio-science, and information sciences.
In our largely 'information economy' you know since we already outsourced a huge portion of the production of actual goods, the consequences of being left behind in tho
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
At this point most of the money being thrown at AI is for scientific and discovery purposes. Because nobody really knows what AI will turn out to be capable of.They have plans for what they want it to do, but that’s all early stage stuff. In 25 years AI will probably be used for stuff few people imagined. What the AI companies have managed to do is get big investors to throw hundreds of billions of dollars at huge private research institutes instead of being fractured into dozens of small programs whe
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Actually AI is integral to making robotics pay. It used to take literally months to years to program in all the features to make a robot (for example) paint a vehicle quarter panel without noticeable blemishes, now it's a matter of a couple of hours at the most. UBI (Universal Basic Income) is going to be necessary before long as the lower skilled workers are replaced by robots, because there are a **LOT** more people who aren't smart enough or ambitious enough to do anything more complex than stock store
Re: It's a useless technology anyway (Score:2)
What if a strong basic income (which entails getting rid of religious GDP fetishism) is the solution?
Basic income isn't enough (Score:3)
You need a comprehensive solution to the billionaires plan to dismantle capitalism.
Capitalism is a complex machine and it requires complex maintenance.
Re: Basic income isn't enough (Score:2)
If we have an indexed basic income can we make our own supply? What if engineers created 3d-printable vacuum cleaners that didn't data-collect because they didn't need to work for control freak bosses?
They will use illegal business practices (Score:2)
You really can't just throw money at the problem of billionaires. They have too much money so they have too much power.
Re: They will use illegal business practices (Score:2)
Is enclosure the real problem you're railing at? What if we printed money to buy back 50% of land and make it Commons again?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: It's a useless technology anyway (Score:4, Insightful)
These companies aren't athletes that love competition, they are sharks that will eat their own young if they can get to them.
Fun fact: Sharks that have live births, such as the great white, usually only have one at a time because the eggs hatch internally and the first one to hatch eats the rest.
Re: It's a useless technology anyway (Score:3)
If a strong basic income is the right answer, we will try every other conceivable option first before getting to that one. The people in charge will wage a literal shooting war on the working class before agreeing to a slice of the profits, control, or property.
Re: (Score:3)
This whole speech of his seems like
"AI isnt profitable, so we'll need you to raise electricity prices on voters so you can give us free power".
Maybe, radical suggestion I know, but maybe they can just fuck off....
The faster the bubble bursts so all these shitbirds lose all their money the happier I will be.
They're going to try to trick you (Score:2)
You need to be ready for that so that you can see through it and focus on pocketbook issues.
When they come for your electricity and water they aren't going to just say gimme gimme gimme.
They're going to tell you that some big bad is coming for your children and for the things you love and for your hobbies and for everything you like to do and enjoy.
And only they can save you from t
Re: It's a useless technology anyway (Score:2)
What if the US is already a surplus energy producer (see eia.gov) with administered retail rates that are raised independently of actual supply and demand conditions because people like you ignorantly hallucinate scarcity?
Re: (Score:2)
Well, I don't know that I fully agree with that. The current AI technology is not that useful compared to the cost of running it. And don't think it is going to cross into useful in the next couple of years. So it feels like we are at the top of the hype cycle where the bubble is about to burst.
But in the long run (10y or so), I think we will have figured out the correct integration of the tools in the situations where it is actually helpful. So I don't think we want to be too behind in the technology.
Now,
Re: (Score:3)
The classic sour grapes reaction. You can't do it, claim it's rubbish anyway.
What is Rob up to these days, anyway? (Score:2)
> It's a useless technology anyway
I hope this quote someday goes on to be as infamous as "No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame." but Slashdot probably isn't relevant enough for that any longer.
Re: (Score:1)
winning is losing (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:winning is losing (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe this is what he was talking about when he said there was a lack of optimism.
AI is inevitable. The only question is who is going to decide how it works, and how it affects their population. The choice of US billionaires or the CCP isn't a great one, but it could also be the EU or US government having a big say in it. At least in the case of the EU, that is likely to result in a smoother transition to whatever is the next stage, for us.
Re: (Score:2)
The only question is who is going to decide how it works, and how it affects their population.
The future is always unclear because emergent things happen that humans are unable to predict; however, one thing is absolutely clear, if you are not part of the ownership class, AI means poverty and death for you and your children. Human life does not matter, only money matters... and that only matters because money is almost a direct representation of power if you know how to control it. There will be billions of unnecessary deaths. Welcome to the New World.
Re: (Score:1)
"China will win social unrest"
Re: (Score:2)
I think the actual winners of this AI bubble will be whoever wastes the least money on this folly.
Re: (Score:2)
Baloney. AI and robotics will create more jobs, by far.
TutTut Chicken Little (Score:1)
Fuck off Huang. If China "wins" it will be because you sold them the technology.
Re:TutTut Chicken Little (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, NVidia NOT selling to China (either because they don't want to buy - which is what they are now saying, or because of US restrictions) is going to ACCELERATE Chinese AI chip development out of necessity (even if imposed by Chinese government - maybe strategically accelerate to self-reliance).
The Chinese power advantage is real - huge amounts of hydro-electric, as well as solar. Trump is shooting US in the foot here by hampering Solar, and the AI co's themselves are talking about putting AI datacenters in space(!) which doesn't sound exactly cost competitive!
Re: (Score:3)
If China win it will be because NVidia didn't sell them GPUs so they built their own. Don't think they can't.
The US isn't in some magic permission where it wins everything. Remember the US lost the space race and only won round 2 by sinking massive amounts of time and effort into it.
Re: (Score:2)
"What are we racing about?"
The usual - ever bigger bank balances for the tech bros, screw the rest of us who are put out of a job in the meantime. But hey don't worry - AI will generate new jobs! For maybe 1 in 100 people who get fired because of it in a best case scenario.
this isn't your choice (Score:3)
The race to surveil and market every human being on Earth. This only works at scale when we dedicate massive computing and energy resources to this bullshit. And governments and billionaires agree, this is what they want for us.
You as the target of this AI gets no choice. You don't get a say in the company board, as you don't hold voting shares. You don't get a say in your government because you didn't pay for a million dollar plates at a Mar-a-lago luncheon. And you don't get to refuse as a consumer becaus
Re: (Score:1)
Race to more productivity. Other than the US, China doesn't dream about sci-fi AI, but builds models that automate tasks.
Meanwhile (Score:3, Insightful)
OpenAI is musing about a "federal backstop" to secure their expansion financing and this the circle of clowning takes another loop.
You're probably right Jenson but this is partly your fault, you and your pals wanted to throw down with this admin and now you can learn they are wildly incompetent and dont care beyond what they can line their pockets with. Trump will never take the measures China does, that requires a functioning government and they just don't believe in that as a concept. Maybe you should have stuck with cringe and woke so keep reaping.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Are there people that are so dense that they are still only just learning that?
You wouldn't think so but yes, it's still so common we have a medal for it: Fell for it Again Award [knowyourmeme.com]
He's already walking that comment back a bit... (Score:2)
https://www.cnbc.com/2025/11/0... [cnbc.com]
Best,
Re: self interest (Score:3)
Do you think the Pentagon is going to stand by and let China unilaterally AI its military?
Re: (Score:2)
It's possible. The Chinese are working while the US is distracted with internal issues.
Nothing like spreading a little fear (Score:2)
Nothing like spreading a little fear to goose your sales, right? "Oh, you don't want to be left behind in the race for AI..."
It's only a race if you are the only one "running" (Score:3)
In reality:
I am concerned that framing it as a race might lead to urgency-driven shortcuts in safety and ethics.
So when Jensen says China "is going to win the AI race", what he might be signalling is: China will win its version of dominating infrastructure or deployment for various kinds of AI, but that doesn't equate to a final victory in AI writ large.
For us thinking about strategy (in SEO, marketing or tech), the takeaway is: Dudes, there's no finish line. We should ask instead: What infrastructures are being built? How will ecosystems evolve? What are the governance, data flows, talent networks doing? And where can you position yourself within that evolving system?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Someone might have said all the same things about the space race.. They'd have been mostly wrong. At least for some span of generations along the axis marked time.
Yes the USA might be matched or eclipsed in 'space' technology in the near future, and maybe already is. In the mean time we are still enjoying huge technical dividends and current economic receipts via Space-X etc.
Over the past two generations we enjoyed a clear advantage in the cold war, and enjoyed a lot of national and even global security.
Are they going to "win bitcoin" as well? (Score:3)
I use one daily, mandated by work. I can't remember the last time I prompted claude 4.5 to write something and it actually compiled, let alone ran without exception, let alone worked. Yet, listening to Huang, Altman, Zuckerberg, Benson, Nadella, Pichai, we should be firing all our junior engineers because their AI is so fucking good, you don't need them any more.
There's a MASSIVE gap between what AI vendors promise and what anyone can actually demonstrate. And we'll know when AI is intelligent because it will actually write code, not just promise to do it someday. IF...you had AI that could write working code from a prompt, you would generate unimaginable wealth...custom video games, custom ETL/data-processing code, services to rewrite legacy COBOL/Python apps to Rust, Java, or whatever the fashionable language....fucking Assembly for all I care. How about custom cartoons?...custom porn? (that look as good as the items they want to replace...not janky stuff with extra fingers or glitchy movements). I've seen interesting demos, but nothing beyond that.
It's been nearly 4 years...all we hear is promises and "someday." 4 years is an eternity in software, especially with so many trillions poured into these. All we have are tools, not solutions. Tools that are still "use at your own risk." Tools that "might" someday replace humans...that "might" actually save more time than they cost to use them. Tools that "may" make you more productive.
They're definitely fun to play with, but I I would personally pay more attention to researchers, not a country blindly imitating us. AI will be one by developing new algorithms, not brute forcing existing ones with subsidized power.
Translation (Score:1)
a. Automation of jobs resulting in decrease of living standards for the middle class.
b. Implementing systemic surveillance undermining citizen's rights to privacy, to dissent politically, and expose corporate wrongdoing.
c. Implementing 'social score' system that encompasses all aspects of individual activities that traditionally were off limits, finding further ways to penalize dissent.
Why would anyone want to win these stupdi prizes?
Re: (Score:2)
Well, no .. that's not what he meant, even if those are some of the outcomes of the spread of AI.
Huang is clearly trying to boost Nvidia's, and his own, fortunes, by appealing to this supposed AI race with China, to get US policy changed to his own benefit.
He's obviously positioning winning of this "race" by the US as a desirable outcome, so going to be focusing on whatever aspects are seen as a positive by the US lawmakers he is trying to influence.
Ah yes, the missile gap lies (Score:1)
Meanwhile, Mr President, there actually is an Electric Vehicle gap.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/523/1
This is the wrong way to look at it (Score:2)
It should not be seen as a race to be won
We should not be restricting access to tech for the Chinese
The tech should all be open source
Cooperation is better than competition
If the tech is available to all, it will prevent the abuses that can occur if the tech is owned by monopolists or governments
Of course, none of this will happen, the insane race will continue
What does "winning" even mean? (Score:2)
Like, how do they "win". Will I be forced to use a Chinese made coding assistant?
Re: (Score:3)
Winning means their AI will wipe them out first.
Re: (Score:2)
Wipe them out? Like it will provide them with responses that have slightly less inaccuracies?
AI is the new Strategic Defense Initiative (Score:2)
Make your enemy outspend you on something pointlessly stupid hoping they'll go bankrupt first.
No humor here! (Score:2)
I propose yet another dimension of comparison for the various genAIs: Which tells the best jokes?
Give each of them a link to a Slashdot story and ask for a funny joke. But I would be certain to make it clear such a joke was not my fault were I to actually post it back to Slashdot...
(Sorry, but I'm too tired just now to do so much "work". Partly because I've been too busy measuring the LLMs on such dimensions as most insincere apologies, lamest sycophancy, and peaks of fury for stupid, verbose, and irrelevan
Wealthiest beggars ever. (Score:1)
A $5 trillion dollar company wants subsidies? Raise capital and build some power plants. If you want subsidies that has to come at the price of either you paying more tax, or the government getting some shares.
He just wants more corporate socialism free shit (Score:2)