TikTok's Chinese parent company, ByteDance, is increasing its computing power with high-performance Nvidia chips to realize its ambitions of becoming a global leader in artificial intelligence, The Wall Street Journal reports, writes UNN.
Details
TikTok's parent company, seeking global expansion, plans to use Blackwell processors, the export of which to China is prohibited.
According to sources familiar with the situation, ByteDance is collaborating with Southeast Asian company Aolani Cloud on plans to use approximately 500 Nvidia Blackwell computing systems in Malaysia, which amounts to about 36,000 B200 chips.
As Reuters notes, the report states that the deployment of the equipment is likely to cost more than $2.5 billion, adding that Aolani currently uses equipment worth about $100 million.
According to the report, ByteDance plans to use the computing power for AI research and development outside of China and to meet the growing global demand for AI from its customers.
An Aolani representative told Reuters that the company fully complies with all applicable export control regulations and aims to provide cloud computing services to a multitude of companies in Asia and around the world.
Last month, Reuters reported that the United States was prepared to allow ByteDance to acquire Nvidia H200 chips, but the chipmaker did not agree to the proposed terms of their use, a source familiar with the situation said.