Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.’s new 950PR AI chip has delivered strong customer
testing results, with ByteDance Ltd. and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. planning to
adopt it at scale, marking a turnaround after limited uptake of its earlier
Ascend 910C despite government support for domestic chips.
Tech firms are more willing to deploy the 950PR due to improved compatibility
with CUDA and faster response speeds, allowing easier migration from Nvidia
Corporation’s ecosystem. Samples were delivered in January, with mass production
set to begin next month and full shipments expected in the second half. Huawei
aims to ship around 750,000 units this year.
While offering only modest gains in raw computing power versus the 910C, the
chip is optimized for AI inference workloads, aligning with rising demand as
Chinese firms shift from model training to real-world deployment. The 950PR is
priced at about 50,000 yuan ($6,900) per card, with a higher-end HBM-memory
version costing around 70,000 yuan.
