To add details

May 8 (Reuters) - A company linked to Thailand's National Artificial Intelligence Initiative is suspected of smuggling billions of dollars' worth of SuperMicrocomputer servers containing advanced Nvidia chips to China, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing sources familiar with the matter.

The intermediary buyer is an unnamed Southeast Asian company referred to by the US Attorney General as "Company 1." Bloomberg, citing sources, said the company is Bangkok-based Aubon Corp.

The report stated that the Chinese Alibaba Group is among the customers receiving these products.

In a statement emailed to Reuters, an Nvidia spokesperson said the company expects its partners to strictly adhere to the instructions at all levels, noting that it will continue to work with the government to enforce the rules.

Separately, Alibaba told Reuters that it has no business ties to SuperMicro, Oppon, or any third-party intermediaries named in the indictment, and said that the banned Nvidia chips have never been used in its data centers.

SuperMicro has not yet responded to Reuters' requests for comment, while Oppon has not yet been contacted.

In March, the U.S. Justice Department charged SuperMicro co-founder Yi-Xian Liao, sales director Rui-Tsang Zhang, and contractor Ting-Wei Sun with carrying out a scheme to route U.S.-made servers through Taiwan to Southeast Asia, where they were repackaged in unmarked boxes and smuggled into China.

Prosecutors say at least $2.5 billion worth of U.S. artificial intelligence technology was smuggled out, including technologies worth more than $500 million that were shipped between April and mid-May 2025.

The report stated that some of the servers sold to Oppon for $2.5 billion went to Alibaba.

It is worth noting that in 2022, the United States banned the export of advanced Nvidia chips to China amid concerns that they could be used for military purposes.