Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said on Saturday that global cooperation in technology would continue even if the incoming US administration imposes stricter export controls on advanced computing products.
US president-elect Donald Trump, in his first term in office, imposed restrictions on the sale of US technology to China citing national security — a policy continued under US President Joe Biden. The curbs forced Nvidia, the world’s leading maker of chips used for artificial intelligence (AI) applications, to change its product lineup in China.
The US chipmaking giant last week reported record-high quarterly revenue on the back of strong AI chip demand, though investors are wary of US-China tensions reheating during a new Trump term.
Photo: Holmes CHAN / AFP
“Open science in global collaboration, cooperation across math and science has been around for a very long time. It is the foundation of social advancement and scientific advancement,” Huang said during a visit to Hong Kong.
Cooperation is “going to continue. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the new administration, but whatever happens, we’ll balance simultaneously compliance with laws and policies, continue to advance our technology and support and serve customers all over the world,” he said.
“We’ll continue to do that and we’ll be able to do that just fine,” he added.
The head of the world’s most valuable company was speaking in the financial hub after receiving an honorary doctorate in engineering from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
During the visit, Huang participated in a fireside chat with the university’s council chairman Harry Sham (沈向洋) in front of an audience of students and academics.
Asked about the huge energy requirements of graphics processing units — the chips behind AI — Huang said: “If the world uses more energy to power the AI factories of the world, we are a better world when that happens.”
“The goal of AI is not for training, the goal of AI is for inference,” he said, adding that AI could discover, for instance, new ways to store carbon dioxide in reservoirs, new wind turbine designs and new materials for storing electricity.
People should start thinking about placing AI supercomputers slightly off the power grid and let them use sustainable energy and in places away from populations, he said.
“My hopes and dreams is that in the end, what we all see is that using energy for intelligence is the best use of energy we can imagine,” Huang said.
Earlier on Saturday, Huang told graduates that “the age of AI has started” in a speech after receiving the honorary degree.
“A new computing era that will impact every industry and every field of science,” he said.
The Taiwan-born entrepreneur, 61, also told graduates that he wished he had started his career at this time.
“The whole world is reset. You’re at the starting lines with everybody else. An industry is being reinvented. You now have the instruments, the instruments necessary to advance science in so many different fields,” Huang said.
“The greatest challenges of our time, unimaginable challenges to overcome in the past, all of a sudden seem possible to tackle,” he said.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
RSS