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Nvidia's CEO Jensen Huang said he thinks the telecommunications giant Huawei is the "single most formidable technology company" in China.
Huawei's "presence in AI is growing every single year," Huang told the Financial Times in an interview published Wednesday.
"We can't assume they are not going to be a factor," Huang added.
Huawei was founded in 1987 by former People's Liberation Army engineer Ren Zhengfei. The Shenzhen-based company started as a reseller of telephone switch equipment but eventually started producing and selling its own telecom equipment.
Huawei's smartphones are hugely popular in China. The company commands a larger share of the Chinese smartphone market than Apple's iPhones.
This is despite the challenges Huawei has faced, particularly in the US.
President Donald Trump said in his first term that his administration wouldn't do business with Huawei, calling the company a "national security threat."
In May 2019, Huawei was added to a trade blacklist by the Commerce Department, meaning that the company could not buy parts and components from US companies without the government's approval.
Before leaving office in January 2021, the Trump administration revoked the licenses of companies that supplied materials to Huawei.
Those restrictions did not abate when President Joe Biden took over from Trump. In June 2021, Biden signed an executive order expanding the number of Chinese companies Americans are prohibited from investing in. Huawei was on the list.
In the final weeks of Biden's term, his administration imposed further export controls on China's semiconductor industry, targeting 140 firms, including Huawei and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. This was the third time the Biden administration had sought to limit China's access to chips after levying restrictions in 2022 and 2023.
But those efforts appear to have only strengthened Huawei's push toward self-sufficiency. The company has been using locally produced chips in its flagship smartphone line, the Huawei Mate, since 2023.
Huang told the Financial Times that the US government's attempts to stifle Huawei have been "done poorly."
"They have conquered every market they've engaged," Huang said.
Representatives for Nvidia and Huawei did not respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.
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Kevin was a reporter at Business Insider's Singapore bureau. He reported primarily on the ins and outs of the business world, whether it be breaking news, covering CEO moves, tracking quarterly earnings, or writing explainers.He also covered careers and workplace issues, and has written about career transitions, the FIRE lifestyle, the college internship arms race, and the job hunt struggles faced by computer science majors.BackgroundKevin joined Business Insider's Singapore bureau in 2023. Before that, he was a civil servant at Singapore's Ministry of Sustainability and the Environment. He was appointed to the Singapore government's Public Service Leadership Programme, a talent development programme that develops capable and talented individuals for key leadership positions in the public service.Kevin’s journalism career began in college, where he first worked as a researcher for Channel NewsAsia and The Economist, and later as an intern reporter at Bloomberg News. In 2017, the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Trust awarded him the Leading Change Journalism Bursary. His stories have appeared in numerous publications, including Fortune, The Japan Times, and The Edge Singapore.Kevin holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the National University of Singapore, where he was an NUS Merit Scholar. He was also the recipient of the PwC Whole Leadership Award, the NTUC Income Prize, the CFA Singapore Prize, and the Outstanding Undergraduate Researcher Prize.
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