US blacklist fails to stop Chinese university from buying Nvidia H200 chips

A Chinese university with ties to the People's Liberation Army purchased Nvidia's H200 AI chips last month despite being on a US export blacklist, according to procurement records, exposing gaps in Washington's technology restrictions. Northwestern Polytechnical University, a defence-focused institution, bought two H200 chips for $123,000 through a domestic supplier, Shaanxi Bosuan Network Technology, rather than directly from Nvidia. The university also secured access to additional H200 and other restricted chips through five rental contracts for computing capacity this year. The US added the university to its Entity List in 2001 and tightened restrictions in 2019, requiring licence denials in most cases. A Reuters review found 26 similar procurement records involving Chinese universities and research institutions acquiring restricted Nvidia chips or computing services through domestic suppliers.