U.S. export‑licensing bottleneck
U.S. approvals for Nvidia and AMD AI‑chip exports to China have slowed sharply because the Commerce Department's licensing unit lost roughly 20% of its staff, creating processing delays. Reports say Nvidia still had not shipped an H200 into China nearly three months after White House clearance and that broader export restrictions are being prepared as approvals lag. (tomshardware.com)
U.S. approvals for Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices to ship artificial-intelligence chips to China are stretching into months as the Commerce Department’s export office loses staff. (bloomberg.com) Bloomberg reported on April 10 that the Bureau of Industry and Security has lost dozens of experienced employees in the past year, with turnover near 20% among rulemaking and licensing staff. The same report said processed licenses are down about 25% and backlogs now cover billions of dollars in exports, including shipments to allies. (bloomberg.com) The export office is the gatekeeper for sales of advanced chips to China because United States rules require case-by-case licenses for top-end artificial-intelligence processors. In fiscal year 2023, the bureau handled 37,943 license applications with an average processing time of 38 days; Bloomberg said that figure rose to 76 days in the first half of 2025. (bis.gov, newsdefused.com) That slowdown is colliding with a policy shift in Washington. President Donald Trump’s administration has been more open than the Biden administration to some China sales of older artificial-intelligence chips, even as officials prepare tighter limits on the newest systems. (bloomberg.com, bloomberg.com) Nvidia’s H200 sits at the center of that split approach. On February 24, Commerce export-enforcement chief David Peters told a House hearing that no H200 chips had yet been sold to Chinese customers, and on March 17 Chief Executive Jensen Huang said Nvidia had received orders and was restarting manufacturing for China. (usnews.com, cnbc.com) The lag matters because China is still a large market for data-center chips, even after two rounds of export controls. Nvidia said in its annual report filed on February 25 that data-center revenue in China grew in fiscal year 2026 but remained well below levels seen before the October 2023 controls. (investor.nvidia.com, publicnow.com) Advanced Micro Devices is caught in the same system. Its annual report filed on February 4 lists China as part of the company’s international business exposure, and Bloomberg said the licensing delays are affecting both Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices as officials scrutinize artificial-intelligence exports more closely. (ir.amd.com, bloomberg.com) Some lawmakers want the administration to move in the opposite direction and block more sales, not fewer. Bloomberg reported on March 16 that Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Gregory Meeks warned that licensing H200 exports to China could damage United States national security. (bloomberg.com) The immediate question is whether Washington can clear the paperwork faster than it rewrites the rules again. For Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices, the market is open only on paper until the licenses actually leave the Commerce Department. (bloomberg.com)
