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China on Friday rejected a report alleging that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had been targeted in a spy plot, dismissing the claims as “groundless speculation.”
The New York Times reported on Thursday that US intelligence officials had previously determined that a senior Chinese executive at a Singapore-based data centre had been delivering information to Beijing.
The exec, named as Alice Huang or Huang Le, was reportedly being monitored over possibly steering AI chips to China and had developed a close working relationship with the Nvidia chief.
Addressing the report in a briefing on Friday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun denied the allegations, branding it as “nothing more than an attempt to smear China.”
A spokesperson for Nvidia told the AFP news agency on Friday that “Jensen’s interactions with Ms Huang are not unusual or unexpected,” adding that the company that employed Alice Huang – Megaspeed – was no different to any other regional customer.
“Our regional cloud customers receive ordinary business information – not sensitive NVIDIA trade secrets – and zero information relevant to national security,” they said, adding that allegations the Singaporean company was smuggling chips to China “were thoroughly investigated and debunked last year.”
US President Donald Trump was briefed on the intelligence findings around a year ago but decided not to act, the NYT reported.
The US and China are locked in an escalating tech race, with artificial intelligence at the forefront, and Washington has sought to restrict exports of the most high-powered chips to the country.
It comes after Trump met with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping last month for talks on safety issues surrounding AI, or super intelligence (SI), as he has taken to calling it.
“A big day with President Xi of China. Super Intelligence (SI) will be a big topic of discussion, but I want to leave it exactly where it is,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social account ahead of their meeting. “That is China’s position also. Our guardrail is the DOJ.”
The two leaders are also expected to meet in November, with the tech likely to be high on the agenda once again.
Additional sources • AFP