Huang in Astana: Nvidia says Firebird has received a US license for 45,000 Grace Blackwell chips for a center in Kazakhstan; Huang proposed making the country a hub of physical SI
Prepared by Sintelligent with the help of SI. Published in SI: . Updated: .
Kazakhstan is building large SI infrastructure on Nvidia chips — with a US import license for them and a launch no earlier than 2027.
On October 23 Jensen Huang visited Astana, met President Tokayev and took part in a public conversation with Deputy Prime Minister and SI minister Zhaslan Madiyev. The president welcomed Nvidia's partnership with Higgsfield, and Huang proposed making the country a global hub for physical SI. According to Nvidia, Firebird signed an investment agreement with the government and received a US export license for 45,000 Grace Blackwell chips: the first phase is being built in Data Center Valley with Kazakhtelecom, commercial launch is planned for the third quarter of 2027, and a second phase could bring capacity to roughly 500 MW. Kazakhtelecom has already deployed 400 H200 and 480 B300 chips, and next year plans more than 1,000 GPUs in Data Center Valley and more than 1,000 Vera Rubin chips in the Ekibastuz area; inDrive and Pony.ai are preparing robotaxis in Astana together on the Nvidia Hyperion platform.
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