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Sources: China AI chipmakers hike prices as HBM shortage bites; Huawei Ascend 950DT up 20%-50%
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Chinese AI chipmakers, including Huawei and Cambricon, have sharply raised prices for current and next-generation AI processors due to soaring costs for high-bandwidth memory (HBM), according to three people familiar with the matter. Huawei's Ascend 950DT accelerator card price has jumped 20% to 50% from quotes two months ago, now above 250,000 yuan ($37,255). Cambricon's next-generation chip, tentatively called the 690, has been repriced 20% to 30% higher. Smaller rivals MetaX and Iluvatar CoreX have made similar increases. The worldwide HBM shortage, exacerbated by U.S. export controls tightened in December 2024, has forced Chinese chipmakers to rely on grey-market channels where HBM costs several times more than for buyers outside China. Older Huawei chips have also risen: the Ascend 950PR now fetches over 80,000 yuan (up ~30% from early 2026), and the Ascend 910C over 110,000 yuan (up from ~90,000 yuan). The price hikes highlight a growing bottleneck for Chinese chipmakers seeking to replace Nvidia products with domestic alternatives.
Source report
Reuters | Wed, September 9, 2026 at 10:10 PM PDT | 3 min read
Chinese AI chipmakers, including Huawei Technologies and Cambricon, have sharply raised prices for current and next-generation AI processors, according to three people familiar with the matter. The increases come as soaring costs for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) squeeze efforts to build domestic alternatives to Nvidia.
Key Price Increases
- Huawei has lifted the indicated price of its Ascend 950DT accelerator card to above 250,000 yuan ($37,255) — a jump of 20% to 50% from prices quoted to customers just two months ago, depending on contract terms. The 950DT, Huawei's most advanced AI chip, is expected to be available in the fourth quarter of 2026.
- Cambricon has repriced its next-generation chip (tentatively called the 690) at 20% to 30% above levels indicated two months ago. An exact figure was not provided.
- Smaller rivals MetaX and Iluvatar CoreX have made similar increases.
The sources declined to be identified because the pricing discussions are not public.
Impact of the HBM Shortage
The price hikes illustrate how a worldwide shortage of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) is reverberating through China's AI industry as Beijing presses companies to replace Nvidia products with home-grown alternatives.
- HBM is a crucial component for AI computing, consisting of vertically stacked memory chips that allow processors to access vast amounts of data at high speeds.
- The advanced HBM market is dominated by South Korea's SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics, and U.S.-based Micron Technology.
- Since Washington tightened controls on exports of certain advanced HBM products to China in December 2024, Chinese chipmakers have increasingly relied on grey-market channels to secure supplies.
- Such HBM typically costs several times what buyers outside China pay. Because memory accounts for a large share of an AI accelerator's production cost, higher prices feed directly into finished cards.
Huawei's Memory Technologies
Huawei has stated that the Ascend 950 series will use two proprietary HBM technologies:
- HiBL 1.0 for the 950PR
- HiZQ 2.0 for the 950DT
The company did not detail where or how the memory is manufactured. The 950DT is built mainly for developing AI models and generating responses, while the 950PR processes user requests before they are passed to the model.
Huawei, Cambricon, MetaX, and Iluvatar CoreX did not respond to requests for comment.
Older Huawei Chips Also More Expensive
Prices of Huawei's earlier-generation products have also climbed:
| Chip Model | Price at Start of 2026 | Current Price | Increase | |------------|------------------------|---------------|----------| | Ascend 950PR | ~60,000 yuan | >80,000 yuan | ~30% | | Ascend 910C | ~90,000 yuan | >110,000 yuan | ~22% |
Broader Market Implications
The price hikes increase the cost of building AI computing capacity and highlight a growing bottleneck for Chinese chipmakers. These companies had benefited from a void in China's $50 billion AI chip market after U.S. export controls restricted access to Nvidia's most advanced processors.
The shortage is forcing suppliers to reshuffle allocations:
- Iluvatar CoreX has doubled its shipments of graphics processing units (GPUs) to tech giant and TikTok developer ByteDance to 100,000 units this year, as computing constraints intensified. The company has also diverted GPUs earmarked for internal use to help meet ByteDance's needs.
- Cambricon has not formally launched the 690. Its current flagship is the 590.
- Huawei is ByteDance's largest domestic supplier, followed by Cambricon and Iluvatar CoreX.
ByteDance did not respond to a request for comment.
Reporting by Reuters
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