Nvidia generative AI chip costs skyrocket in Japan

Costs for generative AI developers are rising as a result of the ballooning prices of semiconductor equipment for data centers from the US-based Nvidia in Japan due to the depreciating yen.

The catalog price of the cutting-edge H100 graphics processing unit was increased by 16% in September to 5.44 million yen ($36,300) by business solutions provider GDEP Advance, an approved Nvidia sales partner. This represents a rise of almost 700,000 yen. Around 80% to 90% of the worldwide market for data center GPUs, which are crucial for creating artificial intelligence services, is controlled by Nvidia.

The Japanese price for H100 GPUs acquired from Nvidia through distributors is established by GDEP Advance. The corporation claims that although the yen's recent fall has been reflected in the Japanese price, the price in dollars has not altered since the product's debut.

The price of the H100 in Japan has risen to its greatest level since it reached more than 5.5 million yen in October 2022 as a result of the yen's decline to about 150 to the dollar.

The A100 GPU from the previous generation, which costs 2.42 million yen, is nearly 2.2 times as expensive as the H100. Companies working on generative AI are vying for high-performance GPUs and look willing to pay more for them.

The lowest H100 pricing on renowned Japanese price comparison website Kakaku.com has increased by nearly 20% in the past three months to over 6.25 million yen.