Super Micro smuggling co-conspirator pleads guilty to sending Nvidia AI chips to China

Broker pleads guilty in Nvidia chip smuggling case

Ting-Wei "Willy" Sun, a third-party broker and fixer charged alongside Super Micro co-founder Yih-Shyan "Wally" Liaw and sales manager Ruei-Tsang "Steven" Chang, has pleaded guilty to conspiring to unlawfully divert Nvidia AI chips to China. According to Bloomberg, Sun's plea is part of an agreement with prosecutors, although the details of any possible cooperation arrangement remain undisclosed. He is expected to be sentenced on Sept. 8, 2027.

Alleged scheme involved fake paperwork and doctored servers

The case against the individuals was revealed earlier this year after it was discovered that they diverted Super Micro servers containing Nvidia chips to China. The three were reported to have sent the servers to a Southeast Asian company, which then allegedly faked the paperwork and created dummy servers for inspectors. Workers then used hair dryers to remove the serial numbers on the real servers to transfer them to the dummy server shells to complete the illusion, while the real servers made their way to China.

Further investigation revealed that the three used a Thailand-based corporation to receive the servers, which were then delivered to Alibaba, even as the Chinese tech giant denied receiving the banned Nvidia hardware.

Super Micro denies knowledge as Liaw fights charges

Super Micro has denied any knowledge of the operation, even as it has netted $2.5 billion in sales since 2024. Nevertheless, the company's shareholders have sued it, accusing it of concealing its dependence on illicit sales to China. Liaw has pleaded not guilty to the charges and was released on a $5 million bond. The Super Micro co-founder is set to go to trial on Nov. 2, even as the third co-conspirator, Chang, remains a fugitive.

Taiwan widens probe into illegal AI chip shipments

Taiwanese authorities are also building their own case against the illegal shipment of AI chips to China, with investigators raiding some Super Micro offices and the homes of six individuals. The company denied that its premises were raided, insisting that it cooperated with the police and provided access to the workstations and gadgets of the employees under investigation. It also said it fired several employees after completing its own independent investigation and has been collaborating with both U.S. and Taiwanese authorities.

Soon after this, Taiwan indicted nine more people involved in the illegal smuggling of Nvidia B300 GPUs. Sun's guilty plea is the latest development in the U.S. clampdown on illegal AI chip exports, which happened soon after another tech CEO was arrested in California for smuggling $300 million in Nvidia AI servers to China, showing how seriously the White House treats protecting its hardware advantage over Beijing in the AI race.

Sources: Tomshardware