President Donald Trump said Monday he had reached an agreement with Chinese President Xi Jinping to allow US chip giant Nvidia to export advanced artificial intelligence chips to China.

The announcement marked a significant shift in US export policy for advanced AI chips, which former US President Joe Biden’s administration had heavily restricted over national security concerns about Chinese military applications.

In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump said he had informed Xi that Washington would permit Nvidia to ship its H200 products to “approved customers in China, and other countries, under conditions that allow for continued strong national security.”

“President Xi responded positively! 25% will be paid to the United States of America,” Trump wrote, without providing further details on how the payment mechanism would work.

Trump criticised his predecessor’s approach, saying it “forced our great companies to spend billions of dollars building ‘degraded’ products that nobody wanted, a terrible idea that slowed innovation, and hurt the American worker.”

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This referred to the previous administration’s requirement for chip companies to create modified, less powerful versions specifically for the Chinese market.

These chips had reduced capabilities — lower processing speeds, for example — to comply with export control regulations.

The president said his decision aimed to “support American jobs, strengthen US manufacturing, and benefit American taxpayers.”

Trump emphasised that Nvidia’s most advanced chips — the Blackwell series and forthcoming Rubin processors — were not included in the agreement and remain available only to US customers.

Under Biden-era restrictions, the H200 and similar advanced chips were blocked from export to China.

First released in the second quarter of 2024, the H200s are roughly 18 months behind the company’s state-of-the-art offerings.

The chips — graphics processing units, or GPUs — are used to train the AI models that underpin the generative AI boom that took off after the launch of ChatGPT in 2022.

The Commerce Department is finalising implementation details, with Trump saying “the same approach will apply to AMD, Intel, and other great American companies.”

The announcement came amid trade tensions between Washington and Beijing, as the two compete for dominance in artificial intelligence technology.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has lobbied the White House intensely to reverse the Biden-era policy despite considerable opposition in Washington to giving Chinese companies access to the chips.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP)