Nvidia’s Campaign to Sell AI Chips to China Finally Pays Off
Louise Matsakis
created: Jan. 29, 2026, 4:10 p.m. | updated: Feb. 1, 2026, 6:39 a.m.
Join us now in the comment section below, where we'll be answering all of your burning questions about China live.
Huang has real reason to be feeling upbeat: His long-running lobbying campaign in Washington has, in effect, finally paid off.
While Huang was gallivanting around China, multiple news outlets reported that Beijing had approved the sale of hundreds of thousands of powerful Nvidia H200 AI chips to Chinese companies.
But under President Trump, a different logic—promoted by Huang and White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks—has prevailed.
By allowing domestic companies to buy H200 chips in limited quantities, Beijing has the opportunity to achieve two strategic goals at once, says Samuel Bresnick, a research fellow at Georgetown’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology.
4 days, 10 hours ago: WIRED