NVIDIA Corporation

In September 2025, China’s State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) issued a formal finding that NVIDIA violated the Anti-Monopoly Law (AML) by breaching the behavioral conditions tied to its 2020 acquisition of Mellanox. Specifically, SAMR alleges NVIDIA engaged in illegal "tying" and discriminatory licensing to forestall competition in the Chinese high-performance networking market. Simultaneously, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued subpoenas in late 2024 as part of an ongoing investigation into whether NVIDIA punishes customers who switch to rival AI chips or use competing software management tools.

Restofworld documented severe labor abuses (debt bondage, recruitment fees, 16-hour quotas) among migrant workers at Taiwan semiconductor foundries supplying Nvidia; The company has a knowthechain benchmark score of 11/100 indicating a lack of progress on internal controls aimed at controlling forced labor.

Nvidia and Intel partnered with China’s three biggest surveillance companies to add AI capabilities to camera systems used for video surveillance across China, including Xinjiang and Tibet, until sanctions were imposed. Similar systems were also used by ICE in the United States.

Beyond that, Nvidia has had a large and influential presence in Israel since 2016. Its 2019 acquisition of Israeli company Mellanox for $6.9 billion represents Nvidia’s largest acquisition ever and the third largest acquisition of an Israeli tech firm. Nvidia's second largest research and development center outside of the U.S. is in Israel, and 13% of its global workforce is in Israel as of 2024.

The Israeli military uses multiple Nvidia products. Several purchases of Nvidia products were disclosed by the Israeli Ministry of Defense during Israel’s 2023-2025 Gaza genocide.