Everyone thought that would happen with Huawei. What actually happened was a whole bunch of major countries banned Huawei imports and a lot of the ones that allowed them in are having second thoughts. Germany, for example, is in the early discussion phase to remove Huawei equipment (which is already deployed) from their cell network.

Exactly. They want to maintain their insane margins with their oligopoly. The second you get a viable cheap competitor, it will all come crashing down.

Of course, it's a massive undertaking to catch up enough to be feasible. But China has the manufacturing experience, and a government initiative could allocate an insane amount of resources behind it if they were motivated to.

So it's obviously in NVidia's best interest to deter it with appeasement.

Good point! Hadn’t thought of that

Large tech companies have been known to buy out smaller competitors before they become a threat or before somebody else buys them out. Not being able to do so with a government-funded Chinese company, I imagine killing the idea before it takes shape is a prudent business decision.