Tech war: Huawei trumpets AI computing breakthrough for China ahead of Xi-Trump call

Huawei Technologies on Thursday unveiled hardware that it said could deliver world-class computing power without using Nvidia’s advanced chips, in a breakthrough that could potentially break the supply chokehold that constrains China’s aspirations in artificial intelligence.

The Shenzhen-based telecommunications equipment giant’s high-profile disclosure came just a day before a scheduled phone call between President Xi Jinping and his US counterpart Donald Trump, as Beijing seeks to minimise US export restrictions while pursuing a policy of self-reliance in technology.

Huawei said it had developed the “world’s most powerful” supernode computing cluster using local chipmaking processes, while also disclosing plans to launch upgraded Ascend AI chips over the next three years. The moves provide a boost to the country’s efforts to build self-reliance in AI computing and offer a wholesale alternative to the US-led AI hardware ecosystem.

“Huawei is seeking to build a ‘supernode + cluster’ computing solution using chip manufacturing processes available in China to meet the growing compute needs,” deputy chairman Eric Xu Zhijun, who currently serves as the firm’s rotating chairman, said at the company’s annual Connect Conference in Shanghai.

Visitors show interest in Huawei’s Ascend AI chip-based CloudMatrix 384 at the World AI Conference in Shanghai, July 27, 2025. Photo: Xinhua
Visitors show interest in Huawei’s Ascend AI chip-based CloudMatrix 384 at the World AI Conference in Shanghai, July 27, 2025. Photo: Xinhua

Tilly Zhang, China technology analyst at Gavekal Dragonomics in Beijing, said Huawei’s announcement was “good timing for China to show strength and gain negotiating leverage”.


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