Reuters reports that according to two sources with knowledge of the situation, NVIDIA has placed orders for 300,000 H20 Blackwell chipsets to TSMC. The order shows high Chinese demand that pushed the U.S. chip giant to go beyond its current stock. The Trump administration gave NVIDIA permission to start selling H20 graphics processing units to China again changing an April ban meant to stop advanced AI chips from reaching Chinese markets because of national security worries. NVIDIA made the H20 chip just for the Chinese market after U.S. export limits targeted its other AI chipsets in late 2023. The H20 has less computing power than NVIDIA's H100 or newer Blackwell series sold in other places.

The new TSMC orders would add to NVIDIA's current H20 stock of 600,000 to 700,000 chips, sources said. To put this in perspective, NVIDIA sold about one million H20 chips in 2024, based on research from SemiAnalysis. After April's sales ban, NVIDIA warned of potential $5.5 billion inventory write-offs and $15 billion in foregone sales. During a trip to Beijing this month, NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang said H20 order numbers would decide if production would start again pointing out that getting the supply chain going would take nine months. After his visit, reports suggested NVIDIA told customers it had limited H20 stocks with no plans to start wafer production again soon. The company has requested that Chinese buyers submit new documentation including order volume forecasts from clients. Despite competition from Huawei's less powerful alternatives, NVIDIA products remain popular in China, evidenced by increased repair demand for banned GPUs, many smuggled into the country.