A co-conspirator in a scheme to illegally export Nvidia AI chips to China has entered a guilty plea in the United States. The operation involved diverting Super Micro servers through a company based in Thailand to Alibaba, bypassing export control regulations.
Participants in the smuggling scheme used deceptive tactics, including falsifying documentation and using hair dryers to remove serial numbers from authentic servers to place them on dummy units. These measures were intended to mislead inspectors while the actual hardware was shipped to China.
Super Micro faces a shareholder lawsuit alleging the concealment of reliance on illicit sales to China, despite the company denying knowledge of the operation. Since 2024, the company has reported $2.5 billion in sales.
Co-founder Liaw has pleaded not guilty and was released on a $5 million bond, with a trial scheduled for November 2. A third individual, Chang, remains a fugitive. Meanwhile, Taiwanese authorities have indicted nine additional people for smuggling Nvidia B300 GPUs.
Super Micro states it is cooperating with both U.S. and Taiwanese investigators and has terminated several employees following an internal probe. The company denies that its offices were raided by authorities.
