Chip Sanctions Against China Became Its Biggest Advantage

July 18, 2026

If that's true, restrictions on chip exports to China aren't working as a technological brake in the way Washington expected. Or they're working as an involuntary accelerator of innovation. Which is a huge irony. And it's not the first time. The restrictions forced Chinese labs to squeeze every compute cycle, and the result is more efficient architectures than those developed by American labs when they had unlimited access to H100s. Although we also have to be honest: Moonshot raised between one and two billion dollars in 2026 and is valued at $31.5 billion. It's not a garage project performing magic with scarce resources.

If that’s true, restrictions on chip exports to China aren’t working as a technological brake in the way Washington expected. Or they’re working as an involuntary accelerator of innovation. Which is a huge irony. And it’s not the first time. The restrictions forced Chinese labs to squeeze every compute cycle, and the result is more efficient architectures than those developed by American labs when they had unlimited access to H100s. Although we also have to be honest: Moonshot raised between one and two billion dollars in 2026 and is valued at $31.5 billion. It’s not a garage project performing magic with scarce resources.

Full episode: https://youtu.be/kWzw1qh8nHw

🤖 AI-generated content: the script, voices, and images for this episode were produced using artificial intelligence tools.

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