Demand in China has begun surging for a business that, in theory, shouldn't exist: the repair of advanced Nvidia artificial intelligence chipsets that the U.S. has banned the export of to its trade and tech rival.

At least $1bn worth of Nvidia’s advanced artificial intelligence processors were shipped to China in the three months after Donald Trump tightened chip export controls, exposing the limits of Washington’s efforts to restrain Beijing’s high-tech ambitions.

Citigroup analyst Atif Malik recently raised his outlook on the total addressable market (TAM) for data center AI chips to $563 billion by 2028, a 13% increase from his previous estimate. This upward revision is largely driven by stronger-than-expected demand from sovereign AI initiatives,