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Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang called Taiwan the "epicentre of the AI revolution" this week, after commenting about plans to invest $150 billion in the country each year. The company also plans to build new headquarters in Taiwan, a project that is planned to cost $5 trillion itself and create 4,000 jobs.
At a launch event in Taipei for the planned Nvidia HQ, Jensen Huang said, "Four years ago, five years ago, Nvidia was spending about 10, 15 billion dollars a year in Taiwan. Now we're spending 100, going to 150 billion dollars in Taiwan each year."
The comments come after AMD's own announcement last week that it would be investing at least $10 billion into Taiwan tech to 'accelerate next-gen AI infrastructure'. Jensen Huang did not say for how many years Nvidia intends to invest such an eye-watering amount into the country. Otherwise, ground will be broken for Nvidia's new headquarters later this year, and the build is estimated to be complete by 2030 (via Reuters).
"Taiwan is the epicentre of the AI revolution," Huang went on to say, "This is where the chips come, packaging comes, this is where the systems are made, this is where AI supercomputers were created. The number of partners we work with here in Taiwan, incredible."
Taiwan is already the base of operations for the largest semiconductor manufacturer in the world, TSMC (not to mention all the other hardware companies that call it home). Huang has previously said "Without TSMC, there is no Nvidia today" and described the semiconductor company as 'the pride of Taiwan.'
It's interesting to compare and contrast these developments to Nvidia's relationship to China. For a start, Huang has repeatedly bemoaned the company's dwindling market share, saying earlier this month that as far as China's AI hardware market is concerned, Nvidia has "now dropped to zero." This is largely due to tense trade relations between China and the US, with the export of AI chips to China being a particular flashpoint.
Earlier this month Huang, alongside representatives from Micron, and Qualcomm, boarded Air Force One with US President Donald Trump in a bid to repair trade relations with China. The US approved the sale of Nvidia's second best AI chip to 10 Chinese firms—though at time of writing China has not yet approved the deal.
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