Nvidia H200 Has Not Entered China, US Officials Speak Out Amid AI Chip Export Tensions

JAKARTA - The United States government has confirmed that so far not a single Nvidia H200 AI chip has been sold to customers in China, although previously Washington had given limited green light for the export.

The statement was made by David Peters, assistant secretary for export enforcement at the US Department of Commerce, during a hearing of the US House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday local time. When asked about the sale of H200 chips to China, Peters replied briefly, "As far as I understand, so far there has been none."

H200 is Nvidia's second most advanced AI chip, a giant semiconductor company based in the United States. This chip is designed for intensive computing needs such as training large-scale artificial intelligence models.

The administration of US President Donald Trump last month officially allowed the sale of the H200 to China with a number of strict conditions. The policy triggered criticism from a number of lawmakers and former officials from both political parties, who feared that the technology could accelerate Beijing's military progress and AI ambitions.

The White House, through AI adviser David Sacks, argues that allowing exports of advanced chips could actually dampen the efforts of sanctioned Chinese companies, such as Huawei, to develop cutting-edge chip designs independently. The logic is simple but controversial: if access remains open to some extent, the incentive to build domestic alternatives could weaken.

But the camp that is harder on China sees a different risk. They assess that high-performance chips such as the H200 can potentially be diverted from commercial use to support the development of China's military and strategic artificial intelligence systems, which could eventually erode US dominance in the field of AI.

For now, the shipment of the chips is still being held up due to "guardrails" or regulatory barriers in the export process. The technical details of the restrictions were not disclosed in detail in the hearing.

On the same occasion, Peters also responded to the issue of smuggling chips to China. Republican Congressman Bill Huizenga alluded to a Reuters report that said Chinese AI startup DeepSeek was using the most advanced Nvidia chips to train its latest AI models, allegedly violating US export control rules.

"Yes, chip smuggling is happening, it is ongoing," Peters said. "We are actively addressing this issue. This includes our enforcement priority."

The Chinese Embassy in Washington and Nvidia did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

This situation shows how semiconductors are now not just electronic components, but geopolitical instruments. AI chips are a kind of "digital uranium" in the global artificial intelligence race. One export decision can impact the balance of technological power between the world's two largest economies. In this era, silicon is not just a business, but also a national strategy.