// TOM'S HARDWARE US — HARDWARE & GADGET
How Shanghai fund manager Kang Wei introduced his wife Alice Huang to Jensen and built $7.5 billion Nvidia AI GPU smuggling operation
The businessman behind Alice Huang's climb into Jensen Huang's inner circle.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
Jensen Huang had a stunning fall from grace — from being one of the richest people on Earth and one of the primary drivers of the AI boom to being implicated in two extramarital affair scandals and resigning from Nvidia in under two weeks. While many are focused on the former Nvidia chief’s relationship with Alice Huang, who was allegedly passing on information to Chinese intelligence, the Wall Street Journal dug deeper into the person who introduced her to Jensen — Kang Wei, a star fund manager in Shanghai who also happened to be Ms. Huang’s husband.
There have been reports that Kang Wei met Jensen Huang in the 2010s, when his investment firm was heavily involved in Chinese gaming companies. It’s not clear if this introduction predated Kang’s relationship and marriage to Alice, but sources close to Ms. Huang said that she was able to get close to Jensen by the 2020s. Despite being a couple, the WSJ reported that Kang seemingly accepted Alice’s relationship with Jensen, with people close to the couple saying that he would often joke that she was a personal assistant to the billionaire.
Kang Wei is not just an average business executive, though. He made a name for himself in the finance world as a strategist for Shenyin Wanguo before taking over the Zhonghai Fund in 2007. This made him one of the youngest mutual fund chiefs in China at that time, before finally setting out on his own and founding Shanghai Hexi in 2010.
It was also around this time that Alice Huang, whose Chinese name is Huang Le, entered the financial industry, first working at HSBC’s private banking arm in Hong Kong, before moving to CITIC Securities, where she attained a vice president position. It was during her time at CITIC that Alice crossed paths with Kang. Shanghai Hexi signed a deal with the securities firm in 2014 and 2015, and by 2016, corporate registry records show that Ms. Huang had joined the investment firm.
The Economic Times reports Alice Huang’s move into Shanghai Hexi resulted in her getting a 25% stake in the company, all of which came from Kang. The remaining shares were shared between Kang Wei, with 48.75%, and his business partner, Zhu Xiaoming, with 26.25%, with Alice Huang’s 25% ownership stake being held through Shanghai Yuxi Investment Management Consulting Co., Ltd. Meanwhile, Kang also started introducing Alice Huang as his wife to his business associates and investors.
One year later, Zhu and Kang had a falling out when one of their investments under a Hexi fund resulted in a major windfall, with the two partners disagreeing on how the profits were to be shared. Nevertheless, the massive profit generated by the deal allowed Shanghai Hexi to purchase Hangzhou Shengfeng, a video game company, for around 500 million yuan from Chinese conglomerate Century Huatong.
Two years after the transaction, in 2019, Hangzhou Shengfeng’s ownership was transferred to an offshore entity, which was eventually consolidated under Osmanthus Vale Holdings — a holding company incorporated in the British Virgin Islands and listed Huang Le, Alice Huang’s Chinese name, as its sole owner. It was then purchased by 7Road Holdings less than two months after it was founded. While Ms. Huang was the signatory in this deal, it’s believed that she served as a “white glove,” a person who operates on behalf of another to conceal their identity — but it remains unclear if this was for Shanghai Hexi and Kang Wei or some other third party.
There is not much information on Alice Huang’s activities between 2019 and 2021. However, Shanghai Hexi invested in Shanghai Longjing Information Technology, a data center-focused subsidiary of Century Huatong in 2020, where Ms. Huang served as a director between 2021 and 2022, according to a report by The Wire China. At about the same time, 7Road Ho