Credit: Alexandre Debiève on Unsplash Malaysia is investigating whether AI chips imported by Speedmatrix, the local unit of Singapore-based cloud firm Megaspeed, were re-exported, the country’s trade ministry said on Friday, Reuters reports. The same scandal that cost Jensen Huang the Nvidia CEO job has reached customs enforcement in Southeast Asia. The probe follows a US senator’s allegation that Megaspeed may have been used to circumvent American controls on advanced semiconductors. Malaysia’s Investment, Trade and Industry Ministry said Speedmatrix imported servers and AI chips as a data-centre tenant, and that it is working with customs to establish whether those chips were shipped onwards, and if so, whether the shipments were legal.
Megaspeed sits at the centre of the storm that engulfed Nvidia over the past fortnight. The US alleges that Alice Huang, a former Megaspeed executive who had a relationship with Jensen Huang, spied for China, which Beijing denies. The New York Times has reported that Megaspeed bought more than $4.8bn worth of Nvidia chips over two years. The company says on its website that it takes US compliance obligations “extremely seriously”, and it did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment on the ministry’s statement.
Malaysia is not waiting on Washington’s rules alone. Since July 2025, re-exporting, trans-shipping, or transiting high-performance AI chips of US origin has required a trade permit, and giving customs false information about such goods is an offence. The ministry said it is working closely with authorities in Singapore and the US and is considering tightening controls further, noting that “all companies operating in Malaysia are expected to take such controls into account” in their international business. Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said Malaysia would cooperate with any investigations, though it has yet to receive requests from Singapore or the US. “Ours is a trading nation.
We welcome investment. We want to make sure the rules are being followed,” he said, per state news agency Bernama. There is no indication so far of Megaspeed-linked chips being shipped out of Malaysia, he added. That last distinction is the whole case.
Chips sitting in Malaysian data centres and rented out remotely, as Chinese firms including Alibaba have done through Megaspeed, remain legal under current rules. Chips leaving the country without a permit would not be. US Commerce agents suspected Megaspeed of smuggling Nvidia chips into China before their probe was halted and handed to the Justice Department. Huang resigned on Thursday after 33 years; Nvidia reports earnings on 17 November.
The question of where Megaspeed’s chips actually went now has customs officers on three continents looking for the answer. Get the TNW newsletter ✕ Close Get the TNW newsletter Get the most important tech news in your inbox each week.
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