Is Huawei finally catching up to Nvidia in the AI arms race? DeepSeek’s research reveals that Huawei’s Ascend 910C delivers 60% of the inference performance of Nvidia’s flagship H100 GPU—a striking achievement for a chip born under U.S. sanctions and made without TSMC’s cutting-edge technology.
While Nvidia has long dominated the AI hardware world with its CUDA-powered GPUs, Huawei’s chip could be the first step in reducing China’s dependence on U.S. tech.
Ascend 910C is the name of Huawei’s secret weapon
The Ascend 910C, built on SMIC’s 7nm N+2 process, punches well above its weight. With 53 billion transistors and chiplet packaging, the processor is optimized for inference tasks, making it a cost-effective alternative for companies eager to sidestep Nvidia’s premium pricing.
But Huawei isn’t just relying on hardware specs—DeepSeek’s CUDA-to-CUNN conversion tools make it easier for developers to switch from Nvidia’s ecosystem to Huawei’s.
How does it compare to Nvidia’s H100 and H200 you ask? Well, in short:
- Training: Nvidia still holds the crown here, with its unmatched reliability for training massive AI models.
- Inference: The Ascend 910C comes impressively close to Nvidia’s H100—reaching 60% of its performance, according to DeepSeek.
Does Huawei have what it takes?
The Ascend 910C proves that Huawei is advancing quickly despite sanctions, but hurdles remain. Long-term training reliability and a lack of software integration are Achilles’ heels for Chinese processors. Nvidia’s CUDA ecosystem, perfected over decades, gives it a major advantage for now.
However, as AI models increasingly converge on Transformer architectures, Nvidia’s grip on the industry might loosen. Huawei is betting big on that shift, and DeepSeek’s optimization tools could tip the scales.
If Huawei continues to refine its AI chips, the Ascend 910C could be a stepping stone to breaking Nvidia’s dominance. With cost-effective hardware, improved inference performance, and domestic manufacturing, it’s clear that Huawei is positioning itself as a serious player.
The real question: Will this be enough to disrupt Nvidia’s global stronghold, or is Huawei still playing catch-up in an Nvidia-led world? It’s best to stay tuned as this AI showdown unfolds.
Featured image credit: Huawei
