Megaspeed International Pte. is a Singapore-based company that builds AI data centres across Southeast Asia, and it sits at the centre of the questions now facing Nvidia. The Wall Street Journal reported on 8 November that the company was spun off from a Chinese company in 2023, and Bloomberg described it in December 2025 as the single largest Southeast Asian buyer of Nvidia chips.
Megaspeed has denied wrongdoing. A statement dated 23 December 2025 is still on its website, where the company calls itself “a compliant and legitimate company”. By our arithmetic, 316 days separate that statement from the 4 November 2026 letter in which three House committee chairs sought a briefing from Nvidia’s chief executive.
Business Pill · Sovereign AI Explained
An evergreen Business Engineer explainer on sovereign AI. It teaches the general idea only and does not discuss Megaspeed.
The key insight: Megaspeed International, a Singapore-based company that the WSJ says was spun off from a Chinese company in 2023, has denied any illegal chip transfers since its statement of 23 December 2025. The WSJ reported on 8 November that U.S. agencies have been investigating the company for more than a year and that it has not been added to the Entity List.
On its company page, Megaspeed describes itself as “an NCP partner of NVIDIA in the Asia-Pacific region”, referring to Nvidia’s cloud partner programme, and as “a core business partner of NVIDIA’s computing power cloudbusiness in the Asia-Pacific region”.
Bloomberg’s 22 December 2025 report described the company as “the once-obscure spinoff of a Chinese gaming enterprise” that, in less than three years, had become the largest Southeast Asian buyer of Nvidia chips, and called it “a focal point of Washington’s long-held fears about semiconductor smuggling into China”.
The Megaspeed record from Bloomberg’s December 2025 report to the Nvidia board’s November 2026 inquiry, compiled from Bloomberg, Megaspeed’s website, DatacenterDynamics citing Bloomberg, Culper Research, the House Select Committee on the CCP and the Wall Street Journal. Allegations are attributed and unproven. The 316 days from Megaspeed’s 23 December 2025 statement to the 4 November 2026 letter is our arithmetic.
What Was Posted on X
“Megaspeed’s name surfaced in deliberations in recent weeks over whether or not to publish the names of several dozen companies, including firms based in China or affiliated with Chinese companies, to the government’s U.S. Entity List, some of the people familiar with the matter said. Such a move would have formally prohibited U.S. companies from doing business with Megaspeed and the other companies and subjected them to strict export controls. So far, neither Megaspeed nor the other firms have been added to the list, and agency officials have decided to put decisions about it in the hands of higher-ranking government officials involved in negotiating U.S.-China trade issues, these people said.”
Bill Bishop (@niubi) posted the Wall Street Journal’s Entity List paragraph on 9 November (UTC). It reports that Megaspeed’s name surfaced in deliberations over the list and that the company has not been added. The piece uses it for the Entity List section.
NEW: We are short Nvidia $NVDA. We believe Nvidia has a significant China problem. Please see our full report and disclosures now available on our website, link in bio.
Short seller Culper Research announced its Nvidia report on 13 May 2026 and said in the post that it is short Nvidia. The report alleged that Megaspeed has been financed by Alibaba via apparent shell companies; Business Insider reported that Nvidia and Alibaba did not immediately respond to its request for comment.
What Megaspeed Says
In its statement, Megaspeed said the Bloomberg article “contains misleading information and incorrect insinuations, including suggestions that we may have been involved in illegal chip transfers”.
The company said that over the previous six months it had “undergone multiple on-site inspections and reviews by key institutions, including the Bureau of Industry and Security of the U.S. Commerce Department, the Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry of Malaysia, and NVIDIA”, and that these had found “no evidence of any violations concerning the illicit transfer of chips or any illegal activities”. It added that it did “not rule out pursuing legal action” against Bloomberg.
How the Record Built Up
The New York Times reported in October 2025 that the company was alleged to have violated export controls, according to DatacenterDynamics. Bloomberg’s feature followed on 22 December 2025, and Megaspeed’s denial on 23 December.
In April 2026, DatacenterDynamics reported, citing Bloomberg, that Bridge Data Centres had given 68.4MW of capacity allocated to Megaspeed at one of its Malaysian sites to another cloud company, Zenlayer. The same report said Megaspeed was under investigation by American and Singaporean authorities and that Megaspeed denies any ties to smuggling.
On 13 May 2026, short seller Culper Research alleged in a report on Nvidia that documents it found “suggest that Megaspeed has been secretly financed by Alibaba via a series of apparent shell companies”. Culper said it is short Nvidia, and its report discloses that it may hold positions in the stock. Business Insider reported that Nvidia and Alibaba did not immediately respond to its request for comment.
On 29 October 2026, Bloomberg reported that Nvidia’s chief executive described the company’s dealings with Megaspeed as “normal and not unusual”. The chief executive also said Nvidia had checked that Megaspeed did not illegally send its processors to China, Bloomberg reported.
On 8 November, Nvidia’s board said it was opening an independent inquiry led by a committee of independent directors with outside counsel, as covered in Nvidia Board Opens Independent Probe 9 Days Before Results. The WSJ reported the same day that officials from multiple U.S. agencies, including the Commerce Department and Justice Department, have been investigating Megaspeed for more than a year, according to people familiar with the situation. It also reported that a representative of the Singapore Police Force said investigations into Megaspeed were ongoing.
The Entity List Question
The WSJ reported that Megaspeed’s name surfaced in recent weeks in deliberations over whether to add several dozen companies to the U.S. Entity List. It also reported that so far neither Megaspeed nor the other firms have been added to the list. The WSJ said Megaspeed could not immediately be reached for comment.
Why It Matters: Compliance Risk in Southeast Asian AI Clouds
The case shows how export-control compliance risk can move to the buyers of AI chips in Southeast Asia, and to the data-centre operators that host them. The Bridge reallocation shows one way that risk reached a landlord: capacity was handed to another tenant while the probe went on, Bloomberg reported.
Update (9 Nov): Bloomberg has released unreleased interview footage of the Nvidia CEO’s on-record views on China and US chip policy; we quote them in an update on the board’s probe piece.
Update (9 Nov): imports figure. Bloomberg reported on 9 November that Megaspeed’s imports of Nvidia products top $4.6 billion, according to Techmeme’s summary of that report. We could not read Bloomberg’s full article, so the figure is attributed to that summary and its basis and period are not stated here.
Update (9 Nov): the Alibaba loan and an investor pitch. The Financial Times reported on 9 November, citing company documents, that Alibaba, through a Singaporean subsidiary called Apex Enterprise Solutions, lent money to Megaspeed’s Malaysian subsidiary Speedmatrix in June 2024, with Speedmatrix pledging its entire business as collateral. The FT said Megaspeed’s balance sheet grew from $33mn to $3bn during 2024, much of it based on its subsidiaries’ dealings. According to two people with knowledge of the matter cited by the FT, Alibaba has been the anchor customer of Megaspeed’s south-east Asia cloud service from the start and remains its largest client; one of them said Nvidia first met Megaspeed to discuss potential procurement because the company had shown its leasing contract with Alibaba. The FT also reported that in early 2025 a person briefly registered as a Megaspeed executive in 2023 and a business partner sought investment from China-based investors for a south-east Asia data centre project worth several hundred million dollars, according to two investors pitched on the deal; one investor said the pair told them they had “no problem securing GPUs” and cited Alibaba as a client. The FT said Megaspeed has strongly denied allegations of any illicit activity involving chips, and that Alibaba did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Structural Read
As we read the record, the allegations against Megaspeed come from news reports and a short seller, while its account of clean inspections by U.S. and Malaysian authorities has not been confirmed by those authorities in the documents we read.
As we read the DatacenterDynamics report, the Bridge reallocation of 68.4MW is the clearest documented business effect so far, and Bloomberg reported it while the probe was still open.
As we read the timeline, 316 days passed between Megaspeed’s denial and the House chairs’ letter, by our arithmetic.
Megaspeed statement, 23 December 2025
“We operate fully within the bounds of all applicable export control regulations and maintain the highest standards of legal and ethical conduct.”
Three Implications
FOR NVIDIA Nvidia’s board said it was opening an independent inquiry led by a committee of independent directors with outside counsel, the WSJ reported.
FOR DATA-CENTRE OPERATORS Bridge Data Centres gave 68.4MW allocated to Megaspeed to Zenlayer, DatacenterDynamics reported, citing Bloomberg.
FOR MEGASPEED The WSJ reported that Megaspeed’s name surfaced in deliberations over the Entity List, and that it has not been added to the list.
The essay argues the AI supply chain is “creating geopolitical leverage that operates independently of who has the best models”.
As we read it, scrutiny of who buys and hosts AI chips in Southeast Asia is one place that leverage shows up. The essay does not discuss Megaspeed.
What Is Not Established
No court or regulator has found that Megaspeed broke export controls, and the company is not on the Entity List, according to the WSJ. Its account of clean inspections by the Bureau of Industry and Security and Malaysia’s trade ministry is the company’s own and has not been confirmed by those bodies in the documents we read. Nvidia’s chief executive has said Nvidia checked that Megaspeed did not illegally send its processors to China, Bloomberg reported. Culper’s financing allegation has not been confirmed by Megaspeed, Alibaba or Nvidia in the sources we read. We could not read the full New York Times reports.
This Week In The AI Supercycle
The Great Convergence of Capital, Power, and Geopolitics
This week’s issue: for two years the AI build-out was priced as a supply story, and last week as a credit story. This week it was priced as a permission story, and the answer arrived as a cost, not a ban.
Megaspeed, a Singapore spinoff of a Chinese company that Bloomberg called the largest Southeast Asian buyer of Nvidia chips, has denied any illegal chip transfers since December 2025. By our arithmetic, 316 days after that denial, three House committee chairs asked Nvidia’s chief executive for a briefing in the Megaspeed case. A U.S. investigation of Megaspeed that the WSJ says has lasted more than a year continues, and Nvidia’s board has opened an independent inquiry.
A note on sourcing. Megaspeed’s statement was read on its website on 9 November 2026. Allegations described here are attributed to the outlets and the short seller that made them; none has been proven, and Megaspeed denies wrongdoing. Culper Research is short Nvidia. We did not contact Megaspeed. The 316-day interval is our arithmetic.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
