Details
🧠 Chip, Chip, Hooray: For a new data center in Qinghai, China Unicom is tapping Alibaba’s T-Head accelerators (comparable to Nvidia GPUs), according to CCTV.
☁️ Compute Power From the Cloud: The chips are not sold directly but provided via Alibaba Cloud, complemented by components from MetaX and Biren.
📈 Market Cheers: Shares jumped more than 5% in Hong Kong, and U.S. premarket trading also saw gains. At the same time, Alibaba issued around 3.2 billion USD in convertible bonds to raise fresh capital.
🧩 Plan B to Nvidia: The deal is part of Beijing’s strategy to reduce reliance on U.S. chips. Nvidia, meanwhile, is struggling under growing restrictions.
🏗️ Expansion at Full Speed: The new funds will go into cloud expansion, international sites, and the development of proprietary AI models.
Big Picture
China is accelerating its push to build a homegrown AI hardware base. With state-owned enterprises like Unicom on board, Alibaba is bolstering its dual role as chip developer and cloud provider. For the global market, the key question is when local alternatives can pose serious competition to Nvidia.
The China Survival Guide for Western Businesses
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