A company linked to Thailand’s national AI effort is suspected of helping to smuggle billions of dollars worth of Super Micro Computer servers, containing advanced Nvidia chips, into China. Bloomberg News reported this on Friday, citing sources familiar with the situation.
Prosecutors referred to the intermediary buyer as an unnamed Southeast Asian firm, which Bloomberg identified as OBON Corp, based in Bangkok, according to its sources. Alibaba Group Holding was among the final customers for these servers, the report added.
In an emailed statement, an Nvidia spokesperson said the company expects its partners to follow strict rules at every level. Nvidia stated it will continue to work with the government to enforce these rules.
Separately, Alibaba told Reuters that it has no business ties with Super Micro, OBON, or any third-party brokers mentioned in the indictment. Alibaba also said that banned Nvidia chips have never been used in its data centers. Super Micro did not immediately no respond while OBON could not be reached right away.
In March, the U.S. Justice Department charged Super Micro co-founder Yih-Shyan Liaw, sales manager Ruei-Tsang Chang, and contractor Ting-Wei Sun. They were accused of running a scheme to route U.S.-made servers through Taiwan to Southeast Asia, where they were repackaged into unmarked boxes and then smuggled into China.
Prosecutors claim that at least $2.5 billion in U.S. AI technology was moved this way. This included more than $500 million shipped between April and mid-May 2025 alone. Some of the $2.5 billion in servers sold to OBON reportedly ended up with Alibaba, the report stated.
In 2022, the United States banned the export of high-end chips from Nvidia to China because of worries that they could be used for military purposes. However, in January this year, they approved sales of Nvidia’s second-most powerful H200 chips under certain conditions.
Separately, Super Micro shareholders sued the Silicon Valley server maker in March. They accused the company of securities fraud by allegedly hiding its reliance on sales to China that violated U.S. export laws.
