Six pallets of unknown Nvidia equipment left Oakland on August 29, bound for Fort Worth, Texas. The truck, bearing a food transportation company logo, picked up the cargo as scheduled before vanishing off the grid. Buyers realized the shipment had never arrived in early September, prompting police to trace the route. Investigators found the vehicle made several multi-hour stops after pickup before losing contact in San Bernardino County. Oakland police confirmed a grand theft report filed on September 13, with no arrests or recovery announced more than two months later.
A Pattern of Sophisticated Theft
This incident is part of a wave of hardware heists exceeding $100 million since June. Thieves have employed GPS location spoofing and even arranged collisions with police escort vehicles to evade capture. Stolen components are often stripped down for gray-market sales or shipped overseas where US tech access is restricted. In 2025, police investigated burglaries around Fremont and Union City involving over $7.5 million in Nvidia hardware. Those thieves obtained vehicles in Southern California before traveling north to the Bay Area. Professor Olaf Groth of UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business noted that if a chip costs about $550,000, it sells for "about $1 million or more abroad." He argues these margins incentivize criminals, stating that cargoes are getting bigger and heists are getting more complex. This points toward a professionalization of the teams hijacking these loads.
Failed Attempts and High Stakes
Not every crew succeeds. In September, thieves stole two trailers marked with Nvidia and PlusAI logos from a California warehouse. Police recovered them nearby after the criminals cut locks to find each trailer loaded with 20,000 pounds of sand. PlusAI works on autonomous trucking solutions with Nvidia, and the sand simulated freight loads. The failure highlights the risk involved in targeting such high-value assets. Authorities have not disclosed exactly how the original Oakland theft was carried out or what specific hardware was taken. The investigation remains ongoing, with no suspects identified. The scale of the loss, valued at $11.4 million, underscores the financial stakes in this emerging criminal enterprise. While some attempts end in empty trailers, others result in significant losses for legitimate businesses. The gap between domestic and international prices continues to drive these sophisticated operations.
