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Ann Cao

China’s home-grown artificial intelligence chipmakers are starting to cash in on Beijing’s self-reliance drive, but a fresh wave of first-half earnings reveals a stark divide between the industry’s rising profit stars and loss-making players.
Shares of Chinese AI chipmakers traded mixed on Monday as investors digested the financial updates.
MetaX Integrated Circuits saw its Shanghai-listed stock rise 2.4 per cent to 691.2 yuan on Monday after reporting a swing to profitability late on Sunday. Cross-town rival Biren Technology surged 18.8 per cent to HK$46.62 in Hong Kong, while Iluvatar Corex dropped 2.2 per cent to HK$388.2 in Hong Kong.
The stock moves followed reports of a pivotal half-year for domestic graphics processing unit (GPU) designers, who are beginning to reap financial rewards from Beijing’s push for tech self-sufficiency and an aggressive national AI infrastructure buildout.
MetaX, which made a high-profile debut on Shanghai’s Star Market in December, posted a net profit of 612 million yuan (US$90.9 million) for the first six months, reversing a loss of 186 million yuan a year earlier.

First-half revenue jumped 44.7 per cent to 1.32 billion yuan, driven by widespread customer adoption and a sharp increase in GPU shipments, according to its stock exchange filing on Sunday evening.
Founded in 2020 by a team of former executives from US chip firm Advanced Micro Devices, MetaX has emerged as one of China’s most closely watched GPU developers as domestic firms race to build alternatives to Nvidia’s AI chips.
The company has confidentially filed for a Hong Kong listing, targeting a debut in the city by the end of this year, the South China Morning Post reported in July.
Iluvatar Corex reported a similar turnaround on Friday. The company posted a net profit of 106 million yuan in the first half, compared with a 609 million yuan loss in the same period last year.
Revenue surged over 191 per cent to 945.7 million yuan, with its core general-purpose GPU products generating 916.1 million yuan.
In contrast, Biren Technology’s results showed a starkly different path.
The company remained in the red with a net loss of 377 million yuan, though that marked a sharp narrowing from a 1.6 billion yuan loss a year earlier. Its first-half revenue stole the spotlight, skyrocketing nearly 1,998 per cent year on year to 1.24 billion yuan – surpassing its total revenue for all of last year.
Exponential growth in AI token consumption has pushed the industry into a new stage of system-level competition, Biren said in a filing on Friday, adding that the trend continued to fuel strong demand for general-purpose GPU computing solutions.
The divergence comes as makers of general-purpose GPUs, an architecture popularised by Nvidia, continue to expand market share despite rising competition from application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) championed by domestic rivals including Cambricon Technologies and Huawei Technologies’ Ascend unit.
Both Biren and Iluvatar went public in Hong Kong earlier this year amid a wave of fundraising by Chinese AI chipmakers, fuelled by Beijing’s push for semiconductor self-reliance in the face of tightening US export controls.


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MetaX posted a net profit of 612 million yuan for the first six months, reversing a loss of 186 million yuan a year earlier


MetaX posted a net profit of 612 million yuan for the first six months, reversing a loss of 186 million yuan a year earlier.


China’s AI chip drive: MetaX and Iluvatar swing to profit, as Biren narrows losses

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}MetaX posted a net profit of 612 million yuan for the first six months, reversing a loss of 186 million yuan a year earlier

MetaX posted a net profit of 612 million yuan for the first six months, reversing a loss of 186 million yuan a year earlier