Huang Le, the cheating partner of former Huida CEO Jen-Hsun Huang and a suspected Chinese spy, was a director of Megaspeed, a Singaporean technology group that once owned Huida AI chips worth billions of dollars. However, AFP found that the offices of Megaspeed and its Malaysian subsidiary were empty.
An AFP reporter visited Megaspeed's office and found it empty; company employees seemed to have disappeared long before espionage accusations came to their door.
Alice Huang, the former director of Megaspeed, is suspected of being a Chinese spy and accused of spying on NVIDIA company secrets for Beijing during her extramarital affair with Jen-Hsun Huang.
Huang Le's personal information is quite vague, making it almost impossible to determine where she lives, where she works, or when she was born.
Still, her influence undoubtedly stretches far and wide, from humble offices in Singapore to sprawling Southeast Asian data centers to the glitz of Silicon Valley corporate boardrooms.
Her relationship with cloud computing company Megaspeed is at the heart of the scandal.
Megaspeed claims to be a core company in the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution, using Huida's advanced chips to support high-performance computing in large data centers; however, the company has also been investigated for allegedly engaging in business with hidden purposes.
According to the accusations, Megaspeed shipped Huida chips to China under the cover of purchasing computer hardware for its Southeast Asian data centers to help Beijing circumvent trade restrictions.
At Megaspeed's office in the heart of Singapore's business district, the glass door is locked and no employees are visible inside. Neighbors told AFP they had not seen anyone coming or going in the past few months.
In Johor, Malaysia, there were also no employees at the office of Speedmatrix, a subsidiary of Megaspeed, located in a shopping mall in a newly developed community.
Company registration information shows that Huang Le was directly involved in the creation of Megaspeed.
According to information, a company related to her acquired 7Road International, a Singapore subsidiary of Chinese game developer 7Road, in early 2023 and changed its name to Megaspeed International.
Huang Le has been registered as a director of Megaspeed for less than one year, and his term is from March to November 2023.
She joined the company at a time when Megaspeed's operations were undergoing drastic changes, transforming the company from an unknown game developer to one of Asia's largest buyers of Huida chips.
Megaspeed's revenue jumped from zero to nearly $300 million in 12 months, according to the company's 2024 financial reports.
During the same period, Megaspeed, which calls itself a "cloud hosting service provider," saw its assets surge from US$32 million to nearly US$3 billion.
According to reports, the value of Huida chips traded by Megaspeed in two years exceeded US$4 billion.
Fund flows across Singapore, Malaysia and the Cayman Islands suggest Megaspeed's business growth may benefit from its relationship with Chinese technology giant Alibaba.
In 2024, Speedmatrix signed an agreement with Singaporean company Apex Enterprise Solutions to use the company's assets as security to prevent future defaults.
Singapore business registration documents show Apex provided financing to Speedmatrix, according to records reviewed by Reuters.
Singapore company registration information shows that Apex is related to Alibaba Group Holding registered in the Cayman Islands through a parent company.
Megaspeed's ultimate holding company is a Singaporean company called Swiftdata. Singaporean businessman Tan Yong Pong (transliteration) serves as a director of both Megaspeed and Swiftdata.
When AFP actually visited Tan Yong Bang's registered address in eastern Singapore, no one answered the door, although he heard a dog barking from behind the door.
"They are friendly. I occasionally meet the lady (who lives there) at the elevator to walk her dog, but we haven't seen them in months," an elderly neighbor told AFP.
Huang Le was at the center of a corporate network linked to numerous shell companies, investment institutions and large Chinese technology companies.
In Hong Kong company registration information, she is listed as a director of Nanjing Lingxing Technology, which operates the popular ride-hailing platform T3 Travel in China.
Other well-known investors in Nanjing Leading Technology include Alibaba and Tencent, as well as Chinese state-owned automakers such as China FAW and Dongfeng Motor Group.
