A day after the U.S. government opened an investigation into whether Nvidia, America's leading chipmaker, violated rules with its sales to China, its CEO, Jensen Huang, met with Chinese trade officials Thursday in Beijing.
Huang had been invited to meet with the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, a state-backed trade body, according to state media. He also met with He Lifeng, China's vice premier for economic policy.
The visit was covered by Chinese state media, which reported that Huang said U.S. controls on Nvidia's sales to China had a significant impact on the company's business. Nvidia, the report said, will "continue to spare no effort" to make products that comply with regulations and "unswervingly serve the Chinese market."
Huang headed to Beijing during a week when his company's relationship with Washington has fluctuated dramatically.
On Monday, Nvidia promised to invest $500 billion in artificial intelligence infrastructure in the United States, winning praise from President Donald Trump's administration, which called the investment "the Trump Effect in action."
The next day, the company disclosed that U.S. officials said it would need a license for any sales to China. The new requirement would force Nvidia to take a $5.5 billion hit on inventory it had already planned to sell in China.
On Wednesday, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, which focuses on national security threats from China, said it was investigating Nvidia's sales of chips across Asia. The committee is trying to determine if the chipmaker knowingly violated U.S. rules on chip sales to Chinese companies, especially to AI startup DeepSeek.
Nvidia has become one of the world's most valuable companies on the strength of booming demand for its advanced chips, which are needed to power AI systems. Its share price was down 6% Wednesday following news of the investigation.
"We regularly meet with government leaders to discuss our company's products and technology," a company spokesperson said Thursday.
Tech companies across China have scrambled to acquire as many of Nvidia's powerful chips as possible as the United States has ratcheted up controls on sales of advanced chips to China. Some companies built up huge stockpiles. Others turned to a thriving black market for smuggled chips.
The U.S. government's efforts to keep advanced chips out of China's hands were started under President Joe Biden.
In 2022, the Biden administration imposed rules to curb the export of Nvidia's most powerful chips to China. Nvidia responded by modifying one of its leading AI chips so its capabilities fell below U.S. government thresholds. The resultant chip, the H20, became a Chinese-specific product.
Washington's controls on chip exports have made it increasingly difficult for Nvidia to do business in China. China accounted for $17 billion in revenue for Nvidia during its last fiscal year, by percentage the smallest portion in over a decade, according to Bernstein Research. Nvidia reported $130 billion in global revenue during its last fiscal year, an increase of 114% over the year before.
A few weeks ago, Huang met with Trump in Mar-a-Lago, his Florida club and residence, at a dinner that cost $1 million per person.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Source Name : Economic Times