AIBRIEF
A San Gabriel, California man faces up to 20 years on the export and money laundering counts and up to 10 on smuggling for an alleged scheme to route export controlled AI servers through Malaysia and Singapore to Chinese buyers.
A 38-year-old San Gabriel man was arrested Thursday on a three-count federal indictment alleging he ran a scheme to ship more than $300 million in Nvidia-equipped servers to China without the export licenses the US requires for high-end AI accelerators.
Greg Lui, also known as Yiu Kong Lui, owns Earthmade Computer Inc. in the City of Industry. Prosecutors in the Central District of California charge him with conspiracy to violate the Export Control Reform Act, outbound smuggling, and conspiracy to commit money laundering, according to a DOJ press release.
The indictment, returned September 29, alleges that between 2023 and 2024, Earthmade received more than $176 million from two Malaysia-based shipment companies while routing servers with Nvidia A100 and H100 accelerators through Malaysia and Singapore to Chinese buyers, Ars Technica reports. One 92-server shipment allegedly went to a Hangzhou-based firm. A separate 100-server shipment carried fraudulent buyer documents identifying a fake "Jackie Lui" as CEO.
If convicted, Lui faces up to 20 years on the conspiracy and money-laundering counts and up to 10 on smuggling. His arraignment was scheduled for Thursday afternoon in Los Angeles. The case was investigated by BIS's Office of Export Enforcement, DoD's DCIS Western Field Office, and the FBI's Counterintelligence and Espionage Division.
The arrest is the second major US export-control indictment touching Nvidia AI accelerators in two months, after the August case against a Nvidia senior manager based in Taiwan. Asked about diversion, Nvidia told Ars Technica that "less than one half of one percent" of its products have allegedly been diverted; the company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Lui case.