In a landmark deal, Nvidia and AMD set to pay US 15% of AI chip revenue from Chinese sales

Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) have agreed to give the US government 15% of their revenue from selling artificial intelligence (AI) chips to China.

This is a highly unusual arrangement in the international tech trade.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang met with US President Donald Trump at the White House on Wednesday and agreed to give the federal government a cut from its revenues. Investors are betting that AI will transform the global economy, and last month, Nvidia became the world's leading semiconductor producer.

The US government halted sales of H20 chips to China in April, but Nvidia last month announced the US would allow the company to resume sales, and it hoped to start deliveries soon.

The chipmakers agreed to the arrangement as a condition for obtaining export licenses for their semiconductors, including AMD's Mi308 chips.

When asked if Nvidia had agreed to pay 15% of revenues to the US, a Nvidia spokesperson said, "We follow rules the US government sets for our participation in worldwide markets."

Reference Sources

1. malaymail - In a landmark deal, Nvidia and AMD set to pay US 15pc of AI chip revenue from Chinese sales
2. thestarmy - Nvidia to pay US 15% of AI chip sales to China: reports
3. huffpost - Nvidia, AMD To Pay 15% Of China Chip Sale Revenues To U.S., Official Says
4. rappler - Nvidia, AMD to pay 15% of China chip sale revenues to US, official says
5. cna - Nvidia, AMD to pay 15% of China chip sale revenues to US: Report

Elon Musk's Tesla launches bid to supply electricity to British households

(Source: AFP)

Elon Musk's electric car manufacturer, Tesla, has applied for an electricity supply licence from the UK's energy regulator, OFGEM, to supply electricity to domestic and business premises in England, Scotland, and Wales as soon as next year.

The business, expected to be branded Tesla Electric, could focus on supplying electricity to consumers who own Tesla products such as cars or batteries.

However, it would not work for households on dual fuel contracts because the company is only applying for an electricity license.

The move comes around two years after Tesla first started hiring for a head of operations to run its proposed energy supply business.

Tesla already operates a power supplier in Texas that allows owners of its EVs to charge their cars cheaply and pays them for feeding surplus electricity back to the grid.

If approved, the move could pave the way for Tesla to compete with energy supply giants, including British gas owner Centrica and Octopus Energy.

Tesla has sold more than a quarter of a million EVs and tens of thousands of home storage batteries in the UK, which could help it gain access to a sizeable customer base.

Reference Sources

1. theguardian - Elon Musks Tesla applies to supply electricity to households in Great Britain
2. bbc - Musk's Tesla applies to supply power to British homes
3. standard - Elon Musk’s Tesla applies to supply energy to British households
4. cnbc - Elon Musk's Tesla launches bid to supply electricity to British households

SK Hynix expects AI memory market to grow 30% a year to 2030

(Source: Reuters)

South Korea's SK Hynix has forecasted that the market for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) for use in artificial intelligence (AI) will grow by 30% a year until 2030.

Choi Joon-Yong, head of HBM business planning at SK Hynix, said that AI demand from the end user was "very firm and strong".

He added that the relationship between AI build-outs and HBM purchases was "very straightforward" and there was a correlation between the two.

SK Hynix's projections are conservative and include constraints such as available energy.

However, the memory business is undergoing a significant strategic change during this period as HBM involves stacking chips vertically to save space and reduce power consumption, helping to process large volumes of data generated by complex AI applications.

Choi said that the billions of dollars in AI capital spending that cloud computing companies such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet's Google are projecting will likely be revised upwards in the future, which would be "positive" for the HBM market.

Reference Sources

1. thestarmy - Exclusive-SK Hynix expects AI memory market to grow 30% a year to 2030
2. bussinesstimes - SK Hynix expects AI memory market to grow 30% a year to 2030 - The Business Times

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