Export Controls

DeepSeek V4 running on Huawei chips illustration

DeepSeek V4 Will Run Entirely on Huawei Chips — And That Changes Everything

The Nvidia Era Is Over — At Least in China DeepSeek’s next flagship model, V4, will run exclusively on Huawei Ascend chips. Not as a backup. Not as a proof of concept. As the entire inference stack. That’s not a press release talking point. That’s a tectonic shift. For years, China’s AI labs quietly depended on Nvidia silicon — H100s, A100s, whatever they could get their hands on through official channels or creative workarounds. That dependency is now ending, and it’s ending fast. ...

Abstract illustration of AI chip smuggling and export controls

Hair Dryers and Dummy Servers: Inside the $2.5 Billion Nvidia Chip Smuggling Bust

Federal agents arrested Super Micro Computer co-founder Wally Liaw on Thursday for allegedly running a $2.5 billion scheme to smuggle Nvidia-powered AI servers to China. The playbook included dummy servers staged in warehouses, hair dryers to peel off serial numbers, and a bribed auditor who skipped inspections to enjoy paid entertainment. This is the biggest AI export control enforcement action in U.S. history. And it reads like a heist movie. ...

Abstract illustration of fractured chip pathways representing the US-China AI divide

DeepSeek Freezes Out Nvidia: China's Hottest AI Lab Just Picked Sides in the Chip War

The AI cold war just got a lot colder. DeepSeek — the Chinese lab that shook the industry last year with models matching Western competitors at a fraction of the cost — has cut Nvidia and AMD out of its upcoming V4 launch. No early access. No optimization window. Instead, Huawei got a weeks-long head start to tune V4 for its own Ascend processors. This isn’t a technical decision. It’s a geopolitical signal flare. ...