Nvidia Corp. NASDAQ:NVDA, the Santa Clara-based maker of advanced AI accelerators, could face growing pressure in China as local companies shift more of their artificial intelligence chip budgets toward domestic alternatives. Bloomberg Intelligence reported on Tuesday that Chinese executives expect to allocate 46% of their AI accelerator budgets to domestic products over the next 12 months, up from 30% today, suggesting Beijing's push to replace American technology may be gaining traction.
Tencent Holdings (TCEHY), Alibaba Group Holding NYSE:BABA, and Huawei Technologies, key players in China's AI infrastructure buildout and supply chain, appear well positioned to benefit from this transition. The survey of 60 executives also found that AI accelerators from Hygon Information Technology and Cambricon Technologies are being evaluated by a large pool of respondents, while 80% of executives said their total infrastructure spending is running over budget this year, mostly because of high AI-related project costs.
For investors, the shift matters because China is planning roughly 2 trillion yuan, or $294 billion, in data-center investment over the next five years, with at least 80% of core technologies such as chips expected to come from domestic suppliers. Nvidia's products remain popular, but its market share is expected to shrink as H20 chips become harder to find and Beijing urges tech firms not to use them, while a global memory-chip shortage may cap growth for Chinese AI firms such as Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. and possibly benefit ChangXin Memory Technologies.