Nvidia Flooded With AI Chip Orders From Oil-Rich Saudi Arabia, UAE In Race For Computational Sovereignty: Report

 Nvidia Corp.'s NVDA AI chips have reportedly found takers in the Middle East, with Saudi Arabia and UAE bulking up on these high-performance chips that power AI software and applications.

What Happened: Saudi Arabia has bought at least 3,000 of Nvidia's H100 chips, priced at $40,000, through the public research institution King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Financial Times reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

Saudi's purchase value will reportedly be worth $120 million by the end of 2023. In comparison, OpenAI reportedly used 1,024 A100 chips, H100's predecessor, to train its advanced GPT-3 model in over a month.

The UAE, which has developed its own open-source large-language model, called Falcon, has also secured thousands of Nvidia chips, the report said. The motive behind the country's purchase is to “own and control its own computational power and talent, have their own platforms and not be dependent on the Chinese or the Americans,” the report said.

“Importantly, they have the capital to do it, and they have the energy resources to do that and are attracting the best global talent as well,” the report said, citing the source.

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Why It's Important: Chinese tech companies such as Tencent Holdings Limited TCEHY and Alibaba Group Holding Limited BABA are also looking to buy high-performance chips from Nvidia, FT said in a report last week.

Nvidia will likely ship 550,000 of its H100 chips globally in 2023, FT said, citing a source close to Nvidia and its foundry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited TSM.

At $40,000, this purchase would be worth $22 billion.

More details could be gleaned when Nvidia reports its second-quarter results on Aug. 23, after the market close.

Morgan Stanley analyst Joseph Moore on Monday said the recent weakness in the stock offers an attractive entry point.

Shares of Nvidia are on a tear this year, as investors fully appreciate its AI prowess.  The stock rallied 7.09% to $437.53 on Monday, according to Benzinga Pro data.

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