AI‑chip export logjam
Approvals for Nvidia and AMD AI‑chip exports to China are slowing because the Commerce Department licensing office is under strain. The Bureau of Industry and Security has roughly 20% staff turnover, and that staffing gap is hobbling licensing decisions for sensitive chip exports. (startupnews.fyi)
U.S. approvals for Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices artificial-intelligence chip exports to China are slowing as the Commerce Department office that reviews them loses staff and piles up cases. (finance.yahoo.com) The bottleneck sits inside the Bureau of Industry and Security, the Commerce unit that enforces export controls on sensitive technology. Bloomberg reported the bureau has lost 101 employees since 2024, including roughly 20% of staff in rulemaking and licensing roles, and some license reviews now stretch for months. (finance.yahoo.com) Those delays hit products that already need case-by-case U.S. approval before they can go to China. Nvidia disclosed on April 9, 2025 that Washington required a license for its H20 chip, and Advanced Micro Devices said on April 15, 2025 that the same kind of restriction applied to its MI308 products. (sec.gov 1) (sec.gov 2) A license is the government’s yes-or-no gate for a shipment, and the gate has become more important as the rules changed. In January 2026, the Bureau of Industry and Security switched the review standard for Nvidia H200-class chips and equivalents to case-by-case review for China and Macau, replacing a presumption of denial. (federalregister.gov) The backlog reaches beyond one company or one market. Reuters reported on August 1, 2025 that thousands of export-license applications were stuck at Commerce and that one U.S. official called it the longest backlog in more than 30 years. (usnews.com) The bureau was already carrying a heavy workload before this latest crunch. In fiscal year 2023, it processed 37,943 export license applications, took an average of 38 days per case, and denied about 2% of them, according to Reuters’ summary of Commerce data. (usnews.com) The controls themselves are not new. The Commerce Department first imposed sweeping restrictions on advanced-computing chips and semiconductor manufacturing equipment for China on October 7, 2022, then tightened and adjusted them in later rules. (bis.doc.gov 1) (bis.doc.gov 2) Nvidia has already shown how expensive a blocked China channel can be. The company said the April 2025 H20 license requirement led to a $4.5 billion first-quarter charge tied to excess inventory and purchase obligations. (nvidianews.nvidia.com) Commerce has not publicly framed the slowdown as a policy reversal. For chipmakers and Chinese customers, the immediate problem is narrower and more practical: even exports that may be legal on paper can sit and wait if the office that signs the licenses cannot move fast enough. (finance.yahoo.com)
