The U.S. government has taken an uncommon step by requiring Nvidia and AMD to share 15% of the revenue from selected AI chip sales in China. As part of an export licence agreement, the companies’ chips—Nvidia’s H20 and AMD’s MI308—have been customised to navigate existing export restrictions.
This arrangement emerged after a meeting between Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and former President Donald Trump at the White House. It’s notably the first time such a revenue-sharing condition has been attached to a U.S. export licence. A band of 20 national security experts, including former deputy national security adviser Matt Pottinger, raised concerns that these chips could boost China’s advanced AI capabilities and even aid its military, though Nvidia maintains that the H20 isn’t designed for military use.
At a time of strained U.S.-China relations, the Commerce Department has been urged to hold off on imposing new export restrictions, in an effort to avoid further diplomatic friction. Meanwhile, China is pushing for a relaxation of its rules on high‑bandwidth memory chips—components critical to next‑generation AI technologies.
