The artificial intelligence world is changing fast, and DeepSeek, a Chinese AI model, has become a major player as China fights back against the big US tech companies.
Its chatbot has climbed to the top of the App Store charts in 51 countries, but we didn’t previously know that it’s relied on Huawei to make it work.
According to AI analyst Alexander Doria, DeepSeek’s R1 large-language model (LLM) was first trained using Nvidia’s H100 but now relies on Huawei’s Ascend 910C chip to generate responses.
This shows that AI computing is moving away from Western-made hardware to Chinese-made alternatives, which could be very significant in the global AI race.
Alexander Doria / X
In posts on X, Doria pointed out that DeepSeek has separated training and inference, reducing its need for powerful GPUs. While Huawei’s 910C chip isn’t as strong as Nvidia’s H100 for training, it works well for responses, helping DeepSeek cut costs while staying competitive.
However, Doria also reports that DeepSeek might train its next AI model using 32,000 Huawei 910C chips. While Huawei might struggle to meet demand, it may prioritise DeepSeek to show that China can develop AI without relying on US technology.
If DeepSeek does train on Huawei chips, it could completely change the global AI market. The US AI industry, already worried about DeepSeek’s success, might face even tougher competition from Chinese companies that can build advanced AI models at a much lower cost.
Dominik Tomaszewski / Foundry
Right now, Huawei’s 910C chip can’t fully replace Nvidia’s H100, especially for training AI models. However, as the AI battle is far from over, DeepSeek’s use of Huawei chips proves that China is closing the gap.
Its success in running DeepSeek’s responses shows that China is making fast progress in AI chip technology. If the 920C chip, successor to the current one, meets expectations, it could be a game-changer in the AI battle.
If you want to know more about this, including whether DeepSeek is safe to use or not, read our detailed explainer article.