ByteDance, Alibaba, Tencent $35B RTX PRO 5500 order faces shortfall
ByteDance, Alibaba, and Tencent just placed a massive order, more than $35 billion, for NVIDIA's RTX PRO 5500 graphics cards.
They're doing this because US export rules have made these chips one of the few powerful options still available to Chinese companies for AI work.
But here's the catch: NVIDIA says it probably can't deliver most of these cards due to production limits.
NVIDIA caps RTX PRO 5500 output
NVIDIA is shifting focus to its upcoming Rubin platform and has capped global production of the RTX PRO 5500 at 3 million units in 2027.
That means only about 5% to 10% of the quantities requested might actually get delivered, so everyone's scrambling for a pretty limited supply.
This whole situation shows just how much global tech trends are shaped by trade rules and company strategies right now.