Qi Lu's MiraclePlus Sanctioned by the US: Former Google Engineer Espionage Case Involves 5 Chinese Entities

Beating AI News Flash: The U.S. Department of the Treasury on October 19 added MiraclePlus, founded by Lu Qi, to its sanctions list. Also named were its Phase I and Phase II venture capital funds, Zhiyuan Enterprise Management Center, and Shanghai Zhisuan Technology—five Chinese entities in total. The sanctions include freezing assets under U.S. jurisdiction, restricting financial transactions, and prohibiting U.S. persons from making certain equity and debt investments.

The sanctions stem from the trade secret theft case of former Google engineer Ding Linwei. The U.S. Department of Justice alleged that during his employment he privately uploaded more than 2,000 pages of Google internal materials involving TPU, GPU chips, and AI supercomputing infrastructure. Ding Linwei later founded Shanghai Zhisuan Technology and, while pitching his project at the MiraclePlus startup camp, claimed he could replicate Google's AI supercomputing technology. The U.S. Department of State disclosed that MiraclePlus provided him with seed funding and obtained equity in the company, and was therefore deemed to have provided material support to the relevant trade secret theft.

In January of this year, a jury convicted Ding Linwei on 7 counts of trade secret theft. However, in August the judge dismissed another 7 economic espionage counts, finding the evidence insufficient to prove he intended to benefit the Chinese government.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury allows MiraclePlus and its 3 affiliated entities until January 19, 2027, to gradually wind down existing transactions under a transitional license.