Alibaba’s RISC-V CPU is much more than a chip: it’s China’s key to technological self-sufficiency.

The RISC-V architecture plays a central role in China’s strategy. This technology is an open-source hardware alternative to both Intel and AMD’s x86-64 designs and the ARM-based CPUs that have proliferated in recent years. For the country led by Xi Jinping, it represents an opportunity to sustain its technological development despite sanctions from the US-led alliance. In fact, the Chinese government has created a consortium of companies and research institutes that seeks to develop chips with this architecture.

Alibaba’s XuanTie C930 Processor Is a Great Opportunity for China
At the end of August, the Chinese company Unisoc unveiled its E450R chip, a processor implemented on the RISC-V architecture that integrates an asymmetric cryptography engine 50% faster than the one implemented by Unisoc in its previous security chip. Furthermore, according to the company, it offers a 50% improvement in transaction-based applications, making it ideal for high-demand environments. Be that as it may, as we have seen, other Chinese companies are working on RISC-V processors.