A California technology company owner has been charged in an alleged scheme to send more than $300 million in export-controlled AI servers to China. Prosecutors say the equipment was routed through Malaysia and Singapore to hide its final destination.
The US Justice Department announced the arrest of Greg Lui, 38, also known as Yiu Kong Lui, on October 1. Lui owns Earthmade Computer Inc. and faces charges of conspiring to violate export rules, outbound smuggling and conspiring to commit money laundering.
Bloomberg Law identifies the hardware as servers containing Nvidia AI chips. The Justice Department’s public release describes US-made graphics processors but does not name their manufacturer, so the Nvidia connection relies on that additional reporting.
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Prosecutors describe a transshipment route
According to the indictment, Earthmade bought controlled servers from US manufacturers during 2023 and 2024. The company allegedly supplied paperwork naming permitted customers in Malaysia or Singapore, then had the equipment re-exported to buyers in China without the licenses required by the Commerce Department.
One cited purchase covered 27 servers worth about $7.6 million. Prosecutors say the shipment left Los Angeles for Kuala Lumpur before a co-conspirator later told a Malaysian official that the machines had gone to a China-based buyer. They also allege that Earthmade received more than $176 million from two Malaysian shipping companies between January and October 2024.
The case arrives as access to advanced processors remains a point of tension between the United States and China. MacObserver has also covered Apple’s effort to seek approval for restricted Chinese memory chips, a different issue governed by its own trade and security rules.
Lui could face statutory maximum sentences of 20 years on each conspiracy count and 10 years on the smuggling count if convicted. The indictment contains allegations, not findings of guilt, and the Justice Department says every defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty in court.
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