
Ant Group, the financial technology giant backed by Alibaba, has announced a major achievement in artificial intelligence (AI) by successfully training a model using domestically produced semiconductors. According to Bloomberg, a source said that Ant Group leveraged chips from Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Huawei to train its AI model, reaching performance levels comparable to those obtained with Nvidia’s H800 chips. A key highlight of Ant Group’s achievement is a reported 20% reduction in costs compared to using Nvidia hardware.
While Ant Group continues to utilize Nvidia’s hardware for certain AI development tasks, the company is now relying increasingly on alternatives — particularly chips from AMD and Chinese manufacturers — for its latest models. This strategic pivot reflects a broader trend within China’s tech industry, driven in part by tightening U.S. sanctions that limit access to Nvidia’s most advanced GPUs.