WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump voiced his support on Saturday for the “brilliant” head of US chip giant Nvidia, Jensen Huang, after a report said he was targeted by a Chinese spy plot.
Trump said the United States was looking “very closely” at the issue.
The New York Times reported on Thursday that US intelligence officials had concluded that a Chinese executive linked to a Singapore-based data centre company, who had interacted with Huang, had been funneling information to Beijing.
China has dismissed the report as “groundless speculation”.
“I have a lot of respect for Jensen. I didn’t know about the specific thing, but I hope he’s going to be OK. He’s a great, brilliant person, and we want to protect our brilliant people,” Trump told reporters at his Florida residence.
“We’re going to check it out very closely,” the president added.
Asked if he would retain Huang as an adviser, Trump said: “I would like to say yes. I mean, unless we find out something to the contrary, I’ve always found Jensen Huang to be very above board.”
“But you know, you’re dealing in a very complex issue,” Trump added.
Huang has advised Trump on AI policy and was among the technology CEOs who joined the US leader on his visit to Beijing to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping in May.
The Taiwan-born businessman has advocated for the use of his company’s chips in China, where Beijing has been accelerating the development of its own semiconductors.