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Two Chinese nationals from California are accused of illegally shipping Nvidia AI chips to China

The U.S. Justice Department announced Tuesday that two Chinese nationals had been arrested in California. They were charged with illegally shipping AI chips worth tens and millions of dollars to China, which included Nvidia's H100s.

A criminal complaint alleges that Chuan Geng and Shiwei Yang of El Monte, both 28 years old, export advanced Nvidia technology and chips to China between October 2022 and July 2025, without obtaining licenses required by the U.S. Commerce Department.

The complaint states that Geng and Yang’s El Monte-based ALX Solutions Inc. was founded in 2022. This was shortly after the U.S. began imposing sweeping export restrictions on technology to China and started requiring licenses for the chip.

Nvidia's spokesperson declined to comment.

More than 20 shipments were sent by ALX Solutions to shipping and freight-forwarding companies in Singapore, Malaysia and other countries that are used to transship illegal goods into China.

ALX received $1 million from a China based company in Jan 2024, and other payments in Hong Kong and China from companies and not freight forwarding companies.

Nvidia H100s chips are high-performance chips that can be utilized to train large language models, as well as for other applications such developing self-driving vehicles and medical diagnosis systems.

According to records, ALX Solutions purchased over 200 Nvidia® H100 chips between August 2023 and July 2024 from Super Micro Computer in San Jose, Calif., claiming that their end users were located in Singapore and Japan.

Super Micro didn't immediately respond to our request for comment.

The pair is accused of shipping illegally Nvidia graphics cards, known as the PNY GE Force 4090. These also require an export license to China.

According to the Justice Department, Geng and Yang were in U.S. District Court at Los Angeles on Monday evening. Geng, who is a permanent resident of the United States, was released after posting a $250,000 bond. Yang, a visa overstayer, will have a hearing for detention on August 12. (Reporting and editing by Alistair Bell; Karen Freifeld)

(source: Reuters)