Woman linked to Jensen Huang boasted of Nvidia GPU access to Chinese investors, report says

Financial Times spotlights past activities of 'Alice Huang'

A woman whom US intelligence officials strongly suspect was recruited by China's Ministry of State Security (MSS) to conduct espionage reportedly boasted to Chinese investors that she could secure advanced Nvidia GPUs.

According to the Financial Times, Alice Huang — a Chinese national known by her given name Huang Le, who had an extramarital affair with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang — sought investment for a Southeast Asian data center project worth hundreds of millions of dollars in early last year (local time).

According to one person who was approached for investment at the time, Huang Le and her business partner Kang Wei claimed there would be "no problem" securing GPUs.

However, Huang Le reportedly did not mention her close relationship with the CEO during the investment pitch.

Under current US export control regulations, Chinese companies are permitted to lease computing capacity at overseas data centers but are barred from directly owning data center assets such as advanced Nvidia GPUs. US authorities have previously investigated whether Megaspeed, a Singapore-based company where Huang Le served as an executive, was involved in smuggling export-restricted Nvidia AI chips into China.

Jensen Huang recently acknowledged the affair with Huang Le.

Huang Le's whereabouts unknown

Attention surrounding Huang Le continues to grow.

According to the Wall Street Journal, The Times and other outlets, Huang Le worked as a journalist for Chinese state broadcaster CCTV and regional network Hunan TV about 20 years ago before moving into finance. She reportedly held positions including a role at HSBC, a directorship at Shanghai Hexi Investment and a vice presidency at Chinese state-owned conglomerate CITIC Group.

However, that career history has not been fully verified — it is drawn from a profile posted on a Chinese private equity fund information website.

Huang Le later became an executive at Singapore-headquartered Megaspeed International in early 2023. Despite holding Chinese citizenship, she is said to have cultivated broad ties with senior figures in the semiconductor industry, aided by her fluent English.

She is believed to have first met Jensen Huang at Nvidia's annual event held in California in early 2024.

Singaporean and Taiwanese authorities believe Chinese intelligence recruited Huang Le after confirming she had developed a close relationship with the CEO.

Her current whereabouts remain unknown.

Meanwhile, Jensen Huang recently issued a statement saying he had been "unfaithful" to his wife. "My actions have hurt my wife and children. There is no excuse for what I did," he said.

"Leading Nvidia is the privilege of my life," Huang added. "I will work to earn back your trust."

yul@heraldcorp.com