GPU (graphics processing unit)
A GPU is a chip designed to do many simple calculations at the same time. First built for video games, GPUs and similar AI chips now do the heavy maths of training and running AI models, and they are in short supply worldwide.
In one line, for a 12-year-old
A GPU is a chip that can do thousands of tiny maths problems at once, which is exactly what AI needs.
An example
Training a frontier model can tie up tens of thousands of GPUs for months.
Why it matters to people
Whoever controls AI chips shapes who can build AI. That is why chip export rules and national computing strategies, including Canada's, have become major policy issues.