Z.AI Completes Gigawatt-Scale AI Data Center Using Only Chinese-Made Chips

Z.AI (formerly Zhipu) has completed a 1-gigawatt (GW) scale AI data center powered entirely by Chinese-made chips and has begun partial operations. The facility's power capacity is enough to simultaneously supply about 750,000 households, making it one of the largest data centers built by a Chinese AI lab.

The project serves as an important test of the real-world capabilities of China's domestic semiconductor industry amid U.S. export restrictions that limit access to NVIDIA chips. Companies such as Huawei, Cambricon, and Alibaba are currently competing as AI accelerator suppliers, narrowing the performance gap with NVIDIA.

Z.AI also operates multiple computing clusters comprising more than 10,000 chips, and after achieving its 2026 revenue target early in July, reaching $1 billion in annual recurring revenue (ARR) is now within sight. China plans to invest roughly 2 trillion yuan (about $295 billion) in data centers over the next five years.