China approves limited Nvidia H200 imports for Alibaba, ByteDance, DeepSeek

China has reportedly approved the import of a limited number of Nvidia's H200 AI processors for leading Chinese technology companies, including Alibaba, ByteDance, and DeepSeek. This decision, following earlier delays, signals a potential thaw in US-China tech relations ahead of a planned summit. The H200 is Nvidia's latest high-performance AI chip featuring 141GB of HBM3e memory and delivering significant performance gains over the previous H100. While the exact number of units approved remains unclear, the move represents a cautious opening in chip export controls.

For Chinese AI companies, this access to cutting-edge silicon could accelerate model training and deployment capabilities, especially for large language models and recommendation systems. However, the limited nature of the approval suggests Beijing and Washington are still treading carefully. The timing — just before a high-level summit — indicates chip access may be used as a bargaining chip in broader trade negotiations. Analysts will watch whether this leads to further relaxations or remains a one-off concession.