Huawei’s founder said the US was exaggerating the Chinese chipmaker’s capabilities and played down his company’s technology amid trade talks between Beijing and Washington that include discussions of export controls.
In a rare interview with China’s state-run People’s Daily on Tuesday, Ren Zhengfei said Huawei’s Ascend chip, the main rival to Nvidia’s products in China, “still lags behind the US by one generation”. He added that the “US has exaggerated Huawei’s capabilities — we’re not that strong yet”.
Ren’s comments come as Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang has sounded the alarm in recent weeks on Huawei’s progress with its artificial intelligence chips, saying Washington’s limits on the US chipmaker selling to China have given rise to a “formidable” competitor that threatens to undermine American dominance of AI technology.