U.S. chipmaker Nvidia announced on Oct. 22 that U.S.-based tech company Firebird had secured a U.S. export license for 45,000 Nvidia Grace Blackwell graphics processing units for an artificial intelligence data center in Kazakhstan's Ekibastuz region, with commercial operations scheduled to begin in the third quarter of 2027 and potential expansion to 500 megawatts. The announcement came ahead of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's Oct. 23 visit to Astana, where he announced Nvidia's investment in Kazakhstan-founded AI video startup Higgsfield.