China’s Tencent leases 100,000 chips from US tech firm Oracle to accelerate AI push: Report

Tencent, the Chinese technology giant, has entered into a significant overseas lease deal with US cloud provider Oracle to access approximately 100,000 advanced AI chips, according to a report by the Financial Times on September 30. The five-year lease agreement, which is estimated to be worth around US$7 billion, includes an upfront payment of about 30%, according to the report.

The information was provided by sources familiar with the matter. The deal highlights the growing computing requirements of Tencent's AI expansion, as the company continues to invest in developing and deploying large language models. Recently, Tencent unveiled a preview version of its new AI image-generation model designed for professional creators, featuring text-to-image and image-to-image capabilities among other features.

As Chinese firms scramble to secure AI chips amid tightening US export restrictions and China's push for home-grown alternatives to US technology providers, the deal underscores the intensity of the competition in the AI chip market. Oracle and Tencent have not yet responded to Reuters' requests for comment on the report.