American chipmaker Nvidia has announced that its board is investigating whether the company’s founder and CEO, Jensen Huang, was targeted by a foreign intelligence agency.
According to a foreign news agency, this development came after a media report alleging that Jensen Huang had a close relationship with a Chinese businesswoman who provided information to Chinese authorities.
Jensen Huang admitted in a message to his employees that he had been unfaithful to his wife and accepted full responsibility for his actions. On the other hand, Nvidia says that the CEO is determined to continue leading the company without interruption.
It should be noted that the American newspaper New York Times reported last month that Jensen Huang had a relationship with a woman named Alice Huang, a former executive at the Singapore-based company ‘MegaSpeed’.
After an investigation, US authorities concluded that Alice Huang was an agent of the Chinese intelligence agency.
US authorities are also investigating MegaSpeed, which buys AI chips from Nvidia and is suspected of helping Beijing gain access to cutting-edge AI chips despite sanctions on China.
US President Donald Trump says he has not spoken to Jensen Huang about the allegations, but he described him as a “good person” and said, “I hope everything goes well. He’s done such a great job.”
According to The New York Times, Trump was briefed on the intelligence report about Jensen Huang about a year ago but decided not to act on it.
When asked if he should have acted on the intelligence briefing about Jensen, Trump said, “No, I don’t think he needed to. He’s a decent man and he probably has his reasons. You have to hear his side of the story first.”
On the other hand, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiaqun rejected the espionage allegations during a press briefing in Beijing on Monday, saying that the “so-called Chinese espionage narrative” is completely baseless.