China’s AI Giants Order $35 Billion in Nvidia GPUs They May Never Get
The Chinese tech firms want over 3 million workstation GPUs for AI inference, but Nvidia may fill 5% to 10% of the demand.
After recently being asked by Beijing to submit their purchasing plans, China’s tech giants have turned those talks into commitments.
According to a Reuters report published on October 20, ByteDance, Alibaba, and Tencent placed orders exceeding 3 million Nvidia RTX PRO 5500 cards, with a combined sticker value passing $35 billion, at roughly $11,400 each.
Neither the companies nor Nvidia have confirmed full fulfillment, with Nvidia indicating it cannot guarantee the orders, per the report.
The story reaches beyond China, because one workstation card is now competing in a supply queue that every GPU buyer shares.
What was ordered and how much Nvidia can supply
Total customer orders from China alone reportedly exceed 6 million units, far outstripping what factories can deliver.
Nvidia has indicated it can manufacture no more than 3 million of these cards worldwide in 2027, leaving half of the Chinese orders unmet even before accounting for other global buyers.
One source said Nvidia told partners they might receive 5% to 10% of what they requested.
Customers should expect early samples in December and commercial deliveries from the first quarter of 2027. Orders are not shipments, and no one has confirmed a delivery volume.
Smaller regional buyers are facing similar squeezes. Shenzhen-listed Tansun Technology disclosed in an October 13 filing that it agreed to buy 20,000 cards while warning that severe shortages could delay delivery.
Why Workstation Cards Drive AI Purchases
Strict US export controls leave Chinese firms with limited alternatives.
Blackwell-based B300 chips remain barred, and Hopper-based H200 exports are subjected to cumbersome case-by-case licensing reviews. The RTX PRO 5500, at last, stands as one of the most capable Nvidia options legally accessible.
Buyers plan to use the cards primarily for AI inference, the less compute-heavy step where trained models process chatbot queries.
Specifications seen by Reuters put the card close to the RTX 6000D, which Nvidia launched in mid-2025 for the Chinese market.
Big firms largely skipped that chip, finding it overpriced and hoping Washington would ease the rules. That hope faded. The 6000D is now discontinued, and one source said its price in China has doubled.
The Impact on Global GPU Buyers
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang noted that export controls stripped the company of its dominant data-centre market share in China. These massive lower-tier orders prove a substantial market remains.
Meanwhile, Huawei continues gaining domestic share as Beijing pushes homegrown alternatives.
For everyone else, the primary bottleneck is foundry capacity.
Reuters reports that starting in 2027, Nvidia will reallocate significant TSMC capacity toward Rubin, its next data-centre platform.
Combined with a 3 million unit production ceiling and over 6 million units of Chinese orders, workstation hardware is poised for tight availability.
Set that production ceiling against millions of unfilled orders, and high-end desktop hardware is looking constrained.
When factories shift their focus and supply lines start to strain, anyone trying to source professional desktop hardware for heavy workloads is likely to feel the pinch.
Source: ByteDance, Alibaba, Tencent place over $35 billion worth of Nvidia chip orders
