Friday, June 18th 2021

NVIDIA to Invest At Least $100 Million in UK's Most Powerful Supercomputer

by
AleksandarK
 Discuss (17 Comments)
NVIDIA, the maker of high-performance GPUs, has yesterday announced that the company will be investing at least 100 million US Dollars into UK's most powerful supercomputer. Back in October of 2020, NVIDIA announced that it will be building a supercomputer in Cambridge, UK, that will be called Cambridge-1. However, the original plan suggested that the investment would amount to around 40 million GBP, which is roughly 55.6 million USD. Now, it seems that NVIDIA is doubling the initial investment plan and the company now wants to invest 100 million USD, just at the initial phase, which would mean that the total budget could be much greater.

As the company is facing difficulties in the process of acquiring Arm Ltd. from Softbank, by building the most powerful supercomputer in the UK, it hopes to show its commitment to growing UK's Arm operations. And more specifically, it is building the Cambridge-1 in the same place as Arm's HQ, which is also Cambridge. In terms of technologies that will end up in this supercomputer, we are still not supplied with exact information, however, we can expect it to combine the latest CPU, GPU, and networking technologies into one powerful machine.
Source: Reuters

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17 Comments on NVIDIA to Invest At Least $100 Million in UK's Most Powerful Supercomputer

#1
Space Lynx
Astronaut
@AleksandarK is there a technical reason in grammar that journalists type "Back in October of 2020" When it could simply read 'In October of 2020' which if the reader is smart, should know it implies the past? I see journalists on every website do this. always typing 'back in' - now I was a philosophy major not English or Journalism, so maybe I just don't get it. /shrug

also on topic - this almost seems like a nice friendly pat on the back investment ever since ARM acquisition was halted... lol hmmm... altruistic or egotistic? that is the question dear watson...
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#2
watzupken
I am not sure if pleasing UK is enough for them to complete the acquisition. What is a 100 mil investment considering the money that Nvidia earns each year, and relative to the 40 billion price for ARM? Feels like Nvidia is just throwing in a bone and see if the UK watchdog will bite. Truth is, this acquisition will not be an easy one and I certainly hope it will fall through. Can't imagine what sorts of damage Nvidia will deliver if they own ARM.
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#3
Space Lynx
Astronaut
watzupkenI am not sure if pleasing UK is enough for them to complete the acquisition. What is a 100 mil investment considering the money that Nvidia earns each year, and relative to the 40 billion price for ARM? Feels like Nvidia is just throwing in a bone and see if the UK watchdog will bite. Truth is, this acquisition will not be an easy one and I certainly hope it will fall through. Can't imagine what sorts of damage Nvidia will deliver if they own ARM.
I don't really understand ARM so can't comment to much on it all. Is my thinking correct, in that Nvidia would be able to make CPU's like Intel and AMD finally?
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#4
Xzibit
So its investing same amount of GPUs but re-evaluated them at scalper prices to increase investment
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#5
AleksandarK
News Editor
lynx29@AleksandarK is there a technical reason in grammar that journalists type "Back in October of 2020" When it could simply read 'In October of 2020' which if the reader is smart, should know it implies the past? I see journalists on every website do this. always typing 'back in' - now I was a philosophy major not English or Journalism, so maybe I just don't get it. /shrug
Not really a solid reason however I did pick it up from others. Also, it eases the process of reading a bit. :)
Posted on Reply
#6
Anymal
Some believe that future is ARM, not x86, so NV might be playing on that card as they also have networking, gpus,... CPU is their unicorn.
Posted on Reply
#7
Vya Domus
I am sure this wasn't done at all with the intention of influencing UK's decision on the ARM takeover.
Posted on Reply
#8
Wirko
lynx29I don't really understand ARM so can't comment to much on it all. Is my thinking correct, in that Nvidia would be able to make CPU's like Intel and AMD finally?
Nvidia can, and does, make Arm CPUs (Project Denver and its successors). AMD has Arm-based microcontrollers in their CPUs. Intel has or used to have an Arm licence, not sure when they last used it. They all have to pay licencing fees to Arm.
Posted on Reply
#9
DeathtoGnomes
Vya DomusI am sure this wasn't done at all with the intention of influencing UK's decision on the ARM takeover.
The unintentional appearance of inpropiety is still enough to raise a few eyebrows.
Posted on Reply
#10
john_
And that's how they will get the approval from UK. They will promise hundreds of millions of investments in UK and they will get the OK from the government.
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#11
TheoneandonlyMrK
Probably had to up investment in order to mitigate the poor efficiency per chip, they want a world beater super computer.
It'll cost.
Nice to see some Nvidia UK love, probably hoping they can leverage this against the UK governments blocking of the Arm deal.
Posted on Reply
#12
watzupken
lynx29I don't really understand ARM so can't comment to much on it all. Is my thinking correct, in that Nvidia would be able to make CPU's like Intel and AMD finally?
Nvidia is already an ARM licensee and able to produce SOCs based on ARM processors even without the acquisition. Apple have no share in ARM, but is still successful in delivering the M1 chip. Likewise for Qualcomm.
Posted on Reply
#13
Xaled
TheoneandonlyMrKProbably had to up investment in order to mitigate the poor efficiency per chip, they want a world beater super computer.
It'll cost.
Nice to see some Nvidia UK love, probably hoping they can leverage this against the UK governments blocking of the Arm deal.
UK love? Behind this bribe there is so much hate and greed not only for UK, but for the whole world! I strongly believe that UK wont fall in this trap.
Posted on Reply
#14
OGoc
watzupkenNvidia is already an ARM licensee and able to produce SOCs based on ARM processors even without the acquisition. Apple have no share in ARM, but is still successful in delivering the M1 chip. Likewise for Qualcomm.
As far as I understand, one of the reasons AMD bought Xilinx is because they have a "perpetual license" to use ARM in the same way AMD has a perpetual license for X86. Nvidia does not have this level of license and could have it taken away from them in the future (as in, they are not permitted to renew their existing license come expiration).
Posted on Reply
#15
TheoneandonlyMrK
XaledUK love? Behind this bribe there is so much hate and greed not only for UK, but for the whole world! I strongly believe that UK wont fall in this trap.
Hate, where you seeing hate, greed yeh, my sarcky comment hinted at other intentions, but hate?!.
Posted on Reply
#16
Xaled
TheoneandonlyMrKHate, where you seeing hate, greed yeh, my sarcky comment hinted at other intentions, but hate?!.
When someone always wants you to pay them more, even when you already are overpaying them, that for me is more than just greed, and could described as hate. Well it surely isn't love, at least.
Posted on Reply
#17
TheoneandonlyMrK
XaledWhen someone always wants you to pay them more, even when you already are overpaying them, that for me is more than just greed, and could described as hate. Well it surely isn't love, at least.
I used the word love sarcastically so, I get you, but I don't think companies operate in the hate realm with customers.
You do ,we disagree but no worries, that's fine too.
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