Nvidia Shipment Worth $11.4M Disappears in Cross-Country Transport
Six pallets of Nvidia equipment vanished during a truck delivery from Oakland to Fort Worth in August, marking another high-value hardware theft in a surge of sophisticated cargo crimes targeting the chipmaker.
An $11.4 million shipment of Nvidia hardware disappeared while in transit between Oakland and Texas this summer, with law enforcement reporting no arrests or cargo recovery more than two months after the incident.
According to reporting by The Mercury News, six pallets containing unidentified Nvidia equipment departed Oakland on August 29 headed for Fort Worth. A truck displaying the branding of a food transport company picked up the cargo as expected, then disappeared from tracking. The loss went undetected until early September when the intended recipients discovered the shipment never arrived. Police investigating the truck's path determined it had paused for extended periods following the pickup before disappearing somewhere in San Bernardino County.
Oakland police confirmed filing a grand theft report on September 13 and stated the case remains under investigation. Officials have not disclosed the specific Nvidia products involved or the mechanics of how the theft occurred.
This incident represents the latest chapter in an escalating pattern of high-value hardware thefts. Reporting by Ars Technica's Ashley Belanger documented thieves stealing more than $100 million in comparable cargo since June. Investigators cited by NBC News have identified criminal tactics including GPS signal manipulation and orchestrated collisions with police vehicles escorting shipments. Stolen components are either disassembled and sold through gray-market channels or exported to regions where U.S. technology access faces restrictions.
Nvidia equipment has emerged as a priority target for thieves. During 2025, law enforcement investigated burglaries of Nvidia hardware totaling more than $7.5 million in the Fremont and Union City areas, according to The Mercury News. Investigators believe an organized group obtained vehicles in Southern California before traveling north to conduct the thefts in the Bay Area.
The financial incentives driving these crimes are substantial. Olaf Groth, a professor at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business, told ABC News that "if a chip costs about $550,000, then they go for about $1 million or more abroad." He attributed the escalation to these margins: "Because cargoes are getting bigger. The heists are getting more complex and that will point toward a professionalization of the teams that are hijacking these."
Not all theft attempts succeed. A September incident documented by Wired involved two trailers bearing Nvidia and PlusAI markings stolen from a California warehouse facility. Police recovered the trailers nearby after the perpetrators cut the locks, only to find each trailer loaded with 20,000 pounds of sand. PlusAI, which collaborates with Nvidia on autonomous trucking technology, had placed the sand in the trailers to simulate actual freight weight.