An alleged affair between Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang and a Chinese businesswoman suspected of spying for Beijing helped channel at least $7.5 billion worth of Nvidia chips to Chinese firms, The Information reported on Tuesday.
Reuters could not independently verify the report.
According to the technology news outlet, Alice Huang worked with her husband and sister to establish a network of companies in China and Singapore to obtain Nvidia chips. She is not related to Jensen Huang.
Nvidia’s board launched an internal investigation on Sunday, while the FBI is examining whether the 63-year-old chief executive was targeted in a foreign intelligence operation.
Jensen Huang has admitted to employees that he was unfaithful to his wife but has not disclosed further details about the relationship.
The Information identified Shanghai Century Litong, founded in June 2023, as a central company in the alleged network. By October that year, it had secured preferred cloud partner status with Nvidia, granting it priority access to chips.
Century Litong was initially linked to Alice Huang’s sister, Huang Yu, through a founding shareholder ultimately under her control, according to the report. The shareholder withdrew from the company in 2024.
As orders for Nvidia chips subject to U.S. export restrictions stalled, Alice Huang reportedly drew on her contacts at the company and its distributors to secure supplies. The network helped bring around 240,000 chips into China, including H100, H200 and some A100 models.
Century Litong operated data centres and rented out computing power using Nvidia chips, some of which were prohibited from sale to China, The Information reported.
The chips were ultimately used by Chinese technology giants Alibaba and Tencent, as well as smaller artificial intelligence laboratories, according to the report.
Alice Huang also served as an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore-registered company with ties to Century Litong. U.S. authorities have investigated Megaspeed over the movement of Nvidia chips from Southeast Asia into China.
The Information reported that Megaspeed used two methods to provide Chinese customers with access to Nvidia chips: renting out computing capacity in Southeast Asian data centres and physically shipping hardware into China.
Some hardware acquired by Speedmatrix, a Malaysian subsidiary established by Megaspeed in 2024, subsequently reached Century Litong, the report said.
Alice Huang, also known as Huang Le, reportedly used her relationship with Jensen Huang to strengthen her business credibility while keeping her role unclear and avoiding a paper trail.
Nvidia did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment. Alibaba, Tencent, Megaspeed and Shanghai Century Litong were also unavailable for comment outside normal business hours.
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