Chinese artificial intelligence and cloud companies are expected to receive only about 1% of the Nvidia RTX PRO 5500 GPUs they ordered, according to a Bloomberg report published on November 4. The figure points to an even tighter squeeze than estimated in October and updates the race for AI hardware in China.
According to Bloomberg, cited by international outlets, orders total about 6 million units, valued at roughly US$ 70 billion at more than US$ 11,000 per card. Of that total, only about 60,000 chips — close to 1% — would be delivered over the next four months. The first few thousand would arrive by the end of 2026, with tens of thousands more around February 2027.
The outlook contrasts with an earlier expectation of about 700,000 units by the end of 2027, now dashed, according to the Seoul Economic Daily. In October, Reuters had already reported that Nvidia warned partners they might receive only 5% to 10% of their orders, and that global production of the card in 2027 would not exceed 3 million units — half the volume ordered in China alone.
The RTX PRO 5500 is a professional workstation GPU based on the Blackwell architecture, and it is not among the most advanced chips barred by United States export restrictions. That is why it became one of the most powerful Nvidia products still available to Chinese buyers — which helps explain the scale of orders from Alibaba, Tencent and ByteDance.
On the supply side, Nvidia reportedly told customers that capacity remains limited by production scheduling conflicts, while the company prioritizes higher-performance, higher-margin semiconductors used by customers such as OpenAI and Anthropic and allocates capacity to the next generation, Rubin. If the shortage persists, Chinese firms are likely to keep relying on domestic alternatives such as Huawei, Cambricon and T-Head for inference — a path also constrained by equipment restrictions and a shortage of high-bandwidth memory.
The 1% and US$ 70 billion figures are reports attributed to people familiar with the matter, not an official Nvidia statement with volumes per customer. Samples of the card were expected in December 2026, with commercial shipments from the first quarter of 2027.
Sources: Seoul Economic Daily; Crypto Briefing; AI Affairs. Previous Geekiki article: Chinese giants order US$ 35 billion in Nvidia RTX PRO 5500 GPUs.
Image credit: RTX PRO 5500 product render, via TweakTown, based on Nvidia promotional material.
Transparency: this article was produced with the help of artificial intelligence, cross-checking public posts and internet sources, including the Bloomberg report cited in the text. The delivery figures are reports attributed to sources, not an official Nvidia confirmation of volumes per customer. Check the original sources for details.
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