Nvidia raised concerns with Taiwanese political officials after prosecutors charged one of its managers in a chip smuggling case, Bloomberg reported . It cited people familiar with the matter.
Nvidia’s representatives said they disagreed with the charges against the manager, surnamed Chang, the people said. They also said he should not be under investigation. The officials replied that they had no role in the case.
Chang was detained in July and indicted in August on forgery and breach of trust charges. Prosecutors in Keelung call him the core figure in a network that sent 74 servers with Nvidia chips to China. Another 56 were seized.
Prosecutors say Chang helped win Nvidia’s approval to sell 130 servers to a buyer without the data centre space for them. They also say he hid that the payment came from a Chinese entity.
Nvidia told Bloomberg it had looked into the case.
“We investigated this matter thoroughly, as is our standard practice, and found no indication that our employee knew of the alleged diversion effort by employees at other companies,” the company said.
It added that it engaged with authorities, as any company would, to provide information they asked for and to look after its employee.
Chen Po-wen, a spokesman for the Keelung prosecutors, told Bloomberg the office was unaware of Nvidia’s contacts with the government. It is unclear which request for information Nvidia meant.
Nvidia also asked TSMC, its main manufacturer, for advice, Bloomberg said. TSMC declined to get involved. Nvidia has no government relations director in Taiwan and only recently advertised the role.
The approach echoes Washington. There, Nvidia’s general counsel called a Commerce official about the Megaspeed probe , which was later paused. Megaspeed denies wrongdoing.
Its founder, Alice Huang, is suspected by US officials of spying for China, which Beijing denies. Jensen Huang resigned as chief executive last week after admitting an affair with her. The two are not related.
Chang faces up to five years in prison. Bloomberg could not reach him for comment.
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