Feb 4 (Reuters) - U.S. prosecutors on Tuesday unveiled

an expanded 14-count indictment accusing former Google

software engineer Linwei Ding of stealing artificial

intelligence trade secrets to benefit two Chinese companies he

was secretly working for.

Ding, 38, a Chinese national, was charged by a federal grand

jury in San Francisco with seven counts each of economic

espionage and theft of trade secrets.

Each economic espionage charge carries a maximum 15-year

prison term and $5 million fine, while each trade secrets charge

carries a maximum 10-year term and $250,000 fine.

The defendant, also known as Leon Ding, was indicted last

March on four counts of theft of trade secrets. He is free on

bond. Lawyers for Ding did not immediately respond to requests

for comment.

Ding's case was coordinated through an interagency

Disruptive Technology Strike Force created in 2023 by the Biden

administration.

The initiative was designed to help stop advanced technology

from being acquired by countries such as China and Russia, or

potentially threatening national security.

Prosecutors said Ding stole information about the hardware

infrastructure and software platform that lets Google's

supercomputing data centers train large AI models.

Some of the allegedly stolen chip blueprints were meant

to give Google an edge over cloud computing rivals Amazon.com ( AMZN )

and Microsoft ( MSFT ), which design their own, and

reduce Google's reliance on chips from Nvidia ( NVDA ).

Prosecutors said Ding joined Google in May 2019 and began

his thefts three years later, when he was being courted to join

an early-stage Chinese technology company.

Ding allegedly uploaded more than 1,000 confidential files

by May 2023 and later circulated a PowerPoint presentation to

employees of a China startup he founded, saying that country's

policies encouraged development of a domestic AI industry.

Google was not charged and has said it cooperated with law

enforcement.

According to court records describing a Dec. 18 hearing,

prosecutors and defense lawyers discussed a "potential

resolution" to Ding's case, "but anticipate the matter

proceeding to trial."

The case is U.S. v. Ding, U.S. District Court, Northern

District of California, No. 24-cr-00141.