File photo: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and Alice Huang
Megaspeed had faced suspicions of helping divert Nvidia chips to China, but Nvidia has said it investigated the concern and found the allegations to be unfounded. US secretary of state Marco Rubio sent a memo to senior officials in Washington earlier this year warning that Jensen Huang was in a close relationship with a Chinese spy, according to the New York Times. US President Donald Trump said on Monday that he had spoken to Huang, who told him he had “no idea she was a spy”. Trump said he believed the Nvidia chief.
Huang, who co-founded Nvidia, has acknowledged having a romantic relationship outside his marriage. The woman, Alice Huang, also known as Huang Le, is alleged to be a Chinese spy. She is not related to the Nvidia chief. Nvidia is a major player in the artificial intelligence (AI) boom and the world’s second most valuable company after Apple. Its chips are central to the development of AI tools and have become a national security concern for US officials seeking to maintain an edge over China in the technology race. Alice Huang was an executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed, a company that has been a customer of Nvidia. It added that a committee of independent directors would oversee the inquiry.
Nvidia on Tuesday said it hired a prominent US law firm to investigate allegations surrounding a relationship between its chief executive Jensen Huang and a woman accused of spying for China, as the matter draws scrutiny from US lawmakers and the FBI. When Nvidia’s board announced the investigation on Sunday, it said there was no reason to believe the company’s trade secrets or national security had been compromised.