Huawei Technologies has proposed supplying more than 2,000 advanced artificial intelligence chips for Egyptian government data centres, a move that could expand the Chinese technology company's AI infrastructure footprint outside its domestic market while drawing a potential counteroffer from US technology companies.
According to people familiar with the proposal and documents reviewed by Bloomberg, Huawei responded to an Egyptian government tender with an offer involving 1,408 of its Ascend 950-series processors for an AI training cloud. The proposal also includes 600 additional Ascend 950-series chips or earlier Ascend 910B processors for two inference clusters. Huawei has outlined a 12-month plan to build the infrastructure.
The proposed infrastructure would support government applications, including military, surveillance and other public-sector use cases. If Huawei secures the project, it could mark one of the company's first significant overseas deployments of its advanced Ascend AI accelerators and give it a larger position in Egypt's emerging AI infrastructure ecosystem.
The development has also attracted attention in Washington. The US State Department has approached Nvidia, Advanced Micro Devices and Microsoft about potentially assembling a consortium to present a competing proposal, according to reports. Microsoft declined to comment, while Nvidia and AMD did not respond to requests cited in the original report.
The potential competition comes as the US and China seek to expand their respective AI technology ecosystems globally. Advanced AI processors have become a central component of this competition as governments and businesses invest in computing infrastructure required to train and operate increasingly sophisticated AI models.
Egypt is also seeking to increase its domestic AI capabilities. Its second National AI Strategy targets a contribution of 7.7% to the country's GDP from AI by 2030. Since Egypt does not manufacture advanced AI processors domestically, access to international chip suppliers remains important to its infrastructure plans.
However, US export controls add another layer to the procurement process. Egypt has been subject to licensing requirements for advanced chip exports since 2023. Washington has simultaneously been working on programmes aimed at promoting American AI technology packages in emerging markets where Chinese alternatives could gain ground.
Huawei already has an established technology presence in Egypt. In 2024, the company launched a Huawei Cloud region in Cairo, its first public cloud region in the country, aimed at serving Egypt and the wider North African market.
The latest proposal could extend that presence from cloud services into advanced AI computing infrastructure. The outcome of the tender could also provide an early indication of how competition between US and Chinese AI hardware ecosystems is developing across emerging markets.
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