On Wednesday (May 21), the Ministry of Trade of Malaysia issued a statement debunking earlier claims that the Malaysian government was involved in or supporting any artificial intelligence project involving local companies and Huawei Technologies.
Local media in Malaysia had reported earlier in the week that the Malaysian company Skyvast Corporation would be deploying Huawei’s Ascend chips for the project.
The Ministry of Trade of Malaysia stated that it wanted to clarify that the project was not developed, supported, or coordinated by the Malaysian government, and it did not constitute any intergovernmental agreement or mandatory national technology program.
According to Bloomberg, Malaysian Deputy Minister of Digital Communications, Zhang Nianqun, announced on Monday (May 19) that Malaysia would be the first to deploy Huawei’s “Ascend GPU-driven AI servers” nationwide without specifying the type.
Zhang Nianqun mentioned in a prepared speech reviewed by Bloomberg that Malaysia would deploy 3000 Huawei main AI products by 2026. He also added that the Chinese startup DeepSeek would provide Malaysia with one of its AI models.
David Sacks, the US government’s AI and cryptocurrency regulator, wrote on X that “the full Chinese stack is here,” as he warned about China’s chips being present. He mentioned that the Trump administration’s removal of global semiconductor restrictions on chip sales to Malaysia from the Biden era was “timely.”
On Tuesday, Bloomberg News reached out to Zhang Nianqun’s office for comments. Her office responded by retracting her comments on Huawei without providing any explanation.
Previously, the US Department of Commerce issued guidelines stating that the use of Huawei’s Ascend AI chips anywhere in the world would violate US government export controls. The current version of the guidelines has removed that statement and now warns the industry to be cautious of the risks associated with using Chinese advanced computing chips, including Huawei’s specific Ascend chips.
Sacks is advocating for a strategy to promote US AI hardware globally and set up security barriers to ensure that companies building data centers in Southeast Asia or the Middle East do not turn to Chinese products.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration has pledged to crack down on the illegal transport of advanced Nvidia chips to China through third countries. Malaysia has been listed by US officials as a specially monitored issue.
Huawei told Reuters that they have not yet sold any Ascend chips in Malaysia and the Malaysian government has not purchased any such chips from Huawei.
The Ministry of Trade of Malaysia added that they will continue to fully comply with all applicable export control laws, national security directives, and new guidelines from global regulatory bodies. Skyvast did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment.