NVIDIA (NVDA) CEO Jensen Huang spotlighted China as a central piece of the global AI economy during the company’s earnings call this week, estimating that the market represents a $50 billion opportunity for NVIDIA this year alone. Despite this opportunity, NVIDIA might not be able to capture the entirety of that given strict export controls, and Beijing’s ongoing feud with the U.S. government.
Even as the export controls are lifted, the bull case on China for Nvidia isn’t entirely clear, as the CCP is pushing Chinese firms to use homegrown solutions. Regardless, Huang has stood firm that the mainland represents a substantial opportunity, and China will be a vital part of their growth strategy and of the AI race as a whole.
China: The World’s Second-Largest Computing Market
Fielding a question from Joe Moore, an analyst at Morgan Stanley, Huang described China as the second-largest computing market globally and home to half of the world’s AI research talent. That concentration of expertise, combined with China’s fast-growing AI ecosystem, makes it a critical region for NVIDIA’s long-term growth plans.
“The China market, I’ve estimated to be about $50 billion of opportunity for us this year. If we were able to address it with competitive products … you would expect it to grow, say, 50% per year as the rest of the world’s AI market is growing as well,” Huang said.
Huang praised the quality of China’s open-source AI contributions, noting that many leading multimodal and large language models have emerged from the country. Among the most notable are DeepSeek, Qwen1, and Kimi, which he said have gained global traction and are accelerating enterprise AI adoption worldwide.
“The open source models that have come out of China are really excellent. DeepSeek, of course, gained global notoriety. Q1 is excellent. Kimi is excellent,” Huang said, pointing to their impact on subsectors ranging from enterprise software development to robotics.
He emphasized that open source innovation, though created in one country, “is used all over the world,” and has become essential for enterprises and SaaS providers building proprietary AI systems.
Navigating U.S.–China Technology Policy
Despite the vast market potential, NVIDIA’s ability to fully capitalize on China’s AI demand remains intertwined with U.S. regulatory policy. Washington has imposed export restrictions on advanced chips bound for China, though certain products (like NVIDIA’s H20) have been approved for use by companies not on the U.S. entity list.
Huang confirmed that NVIDIA is in discussions with the U.S. administration about the importance of American companies maintaining access to the Chinese market. He also hinted that the company’s latest Blackwell architecture could ultimately make its way into China, provided that regulatory conditions allow.
“The opportunity for us to bring Blackwell to the China market is a real possibility,” Huang said. “We just have to keep advocating the sensibility and the importance of American tech companies to be able to lead and win the AI race and help make the American tech stack the global standard.”
Strategic Stakes for NVIDIA
The CEO’s remarks underscore both the commercial stakes and the geopolitical sensitivities surrounding NVIDIA’s position in China. With global AI infrastructure spending accelerating, Huang framed China not only as a revenue opportunity, but as an essential locus of innovation that U.S. companies cannot afford to ignore.
If NVIDIA can secure the necessary licenses and approvals, the company could tap into one of the fastest-growing AI markets in the world, adding billions in revenue while reinforcing its dominance in global AI infrastructure.
