NVIDIA designs the chips and software that power artificial intelligence and sells complete data center systems to cloud providers, AI labs, and other businesses, along with GeForce graphics cards for gamers. Its GPUs, chips that perform thousands of calculations at once, became the main hardware for AI after researchers used them to train the AlexNet image-recognition model in 2012. NVIDIA connects many GPUs with its own processors and networking gear into servers and rack-sized computers, and developers program them through its CUDA software. These systems bring in most of its sales, and it also makes chips for cars and robots. Jensen Huang co-founded NVIDIA in 1993, and it is based in Santa Clara, California.
Company Size
10,001+
Company Stage
IPO
Headquarters
Santa Clara, California
Founded
1993
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Nvidia is pushing paid software to make its earnings less reliant on hardware sales. AI Enterprise lists at $4,500 per GPU annually, and Mission Control automates workload scheduling and recovery. Hardware still drives results. Second-quarter revenue grew 106%, and management expects third-quarter revenue of $108 billion. Gross margin is forecast to ease from 75% to 74%. Nvidia trades at 25x forward earnings, against 39x for Advanced Micro Devices. First-half free cash flow was $69.9 billion, but supply and capacity commitments reached $279 billion. Nvidia does not separately disclose recurring software revenue or renewal rates. Free alternatives exist, and some GPUs include five-year licences.
Nvidia launched RTX Spark laptops on October 16, bringing local AI agents and its CUDA software platform to premium Windows machines. Its shares traded at $215.7, down 0.7%, at 9:40 ET. Six manufacturers are selling systems that start at $2,599. TechRadar reported configurations with up to 128GB of unified memory, but cautioned that memory alone does not guarantee real-world AI performance. The test for investors is whether the features persuade buyers to spend more and lift chip sales. Nvidia has not disclosed its revenue per device. Analysts will watch sales volumes, purchases of higher-end configurations, and sustained developer usage.
Nvidia has expanded its Nemotron 3.5 open AI model lineup, adding variants aimed at higher efficiency and performance. It also partnered with Mindbeam to tune the models for open-source use and improve inference on Nvidia hardware. Separately, Taiwan backed a $4 billion industrial park in Texas to strengthen Nvidia-linked AI supply chains inside the US. Not all the news was positive. CoreWeave, a major Nvidia-aligned AI cloud customer, faces debt pressure that is unsettling confidence in AI infrastructure funding. If credit stays tight, orders could slow.
NVIDIA today launched RTX Spark laptops, bringing its RTX graphics and AI platform to slim Windows PCs. They are available globally from ASUS, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Microsoft, and MSI, with more systems to follow. Each laptop runs on a single superchip that combines a Blackwell RTX GPU and a Grace CPU. It offers up to 128GB of unified memory and up to 1 petaflop of AI performance, enough to run large AI models locally. NVIDIA says the machines can render 3D scenes up to 90GB and edit 8K video, even when unplugged. Adobe's Photoshop and Premiere offer native support in beta. Prices start at $2,599 and vary by region.
Nvidia (NVDA) shares rose 0.4% in premarket trading on Friday, even as Micron Technology, Intel, and Advanced Micro Devices fell 0.2% to 1.1% amid a broader chip selloff. The stock has gained 16.8% so far this year. On Thursday, Nvidia unveiled three open-weight Nemotron 3.5 AI models built for agentic AI applications. Chief executive officer Jensen Huang also said on the BG2 Pod podcast that the company receives AI chip orders almost daily. "We keep increasing more supply and the order books keeps going up," he said. Strong results from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. and ASML Holding earlier in the week eased fears of slowing AI chip demand. Still, investors continue to weigh AI spending against rising infrastructure costs.