Deepseek Nvidia Chip Questions: Singapore answers

The Department of Trade and the Singapore Industry (MTI) said on Saturday in a statement that it expects that US companies comply with American export controls and local laws, following questions On the chips used by Deepseek of China to produce its AI model.

The markets were shaken this week after Deepseek said that his large language model surpasses the Openai, but cost a price fraction to train. However, questions were quickly raised about the origin of the semiconductors used to build the DEEPSEK R1 reasoning model, given the American restrictions on exporting the AI ​​advanced fleas in China.

Friday, Bloomberg reported that US officials were investigating to find out if Deepseek had bought advanced semiconductors from the Nvidia flea manufacturer via third parties in Singapore.

An NVIDIA spokesperson told CNBC on Monday that the chips used by Deepseek were fully in line with exports. Deepseek was not immediately available to comment when he was contacted by CNBC.

“We expect American companies, such as Nvidia, comply with American export controls and our national legislation. Our customs and application organizations will continue to work in close collaboration with their American counterparts” said MTI in his press release.

“We have always confirmed the rule of law and act in a decisive and firm manner against individuals and companies that flout the rules.”

In its third quarter results published in November, Nvidia said that Singapore represented almost 22% of its income, but added that: “Most of the shipments associated with Singapore income were in places other than Singapore and expeditions to Singapore were insignificant. “

MTI quoted Nvidia’s comments in his declaration on Saturday and said that the flea manufacturer said that there was no reason to believe that Deepseek had obtained export -controlled products via Singapore.

“Singapore is an international shopping center. Large American and European companies have important operations here. Nvidia has explained that many of these customers use their commercial entities in Singapore to buy fleas for products for the United States and D ‘Other Western countries, “added MTI.

– Ryan Browne of CNBC contributed to this report.