Nscale Helped ByteDance Unit Access Nvidia Chips, Skirting US Rules, Reports Say
ByteDance rented computing power from British AI infrastructure startup Nscale to obtain Nvidia chips it could not get in China, reports say, sidestepping US restrictions.
The account describes the arrangement as running through a ByteDance subsidiary and through Nscale's computing capacity rather than through chips sold directly to the Chinese company. The reports say the deal gave the TikTok parent access to processors it could not obtain in China because of US restrictions, and they frame the arrangement as a way of swerving those rules.
Sifted published the report on 23 September 2026. It described Nscale as a UK-based provider of AI infrastructure that supplies computing power to outside customers, a model in which the company installs Nvidia processors in its own facilities and sells access to them rather than the hardware itself.
For ByteDance, renting capacity abroad would put Nvidia hardware within reach of its AI teams at a time when US export controls limit what the company can buy inside China. The company has been investing in AI models and supporting infrastructure for its own products and for services sold to other businesses.
US rules restrict sales of advanced Nvidia chips to customers in China, and Chinese technology companies have looked outside the mainland for both hardware and computing power as a result. Renting capacity from operators in third countries has become one route by which such companies reach Nvidia processors.