NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang Says NVIDIA-Branded CPUs Could be Coming

[AleksandarK]

It was just yesterday that we have received the news of NVIDIA's latest move - acquiring Arm Ltd. from Softbank Group for $40 billion. However, it seems like there are more reasons for the deal than what meets the eye. In the briefing regarding the acquisition, NVIDIA's CEO was asked a question, by Timothy Prickett Morgan, from TheNextPlatform, about NVIDIA's plans for a possible implementation of Arm's Neoverse core in an NVIDIA-branded CPU design and start selling them to data centers. To that question, Mr. Huang gave a prolonged answer indirectly saying that the company can build the CPU if there is a market for it.

He explains that there is an entire network surrounding the Arm ecosystem and that there may be customers interested in contracting NVIDIA to build them semi-custom or completely custom chip based on Arm ISA on NVIDIA's own interest. Any of these options are available and Mr. Haung says that they are there for the best interest of the ecosystem to enrich it enhance it even further. This means that it is just a matter of time before we see NVIDIA-branded CPU make its way to data-center or some other areas of technology, so we have to wait and see for ourselves.


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[AnarchoPrimitiv]

I've said it before and I'll say I to again, my only priority is what's best for the consumer and what's best for the consumer is getting NEW players into old markets, not OLD players into new markets.... I'd rather see a completely new entity enter the CPU market, not a big established player like Nvidia... We don't need already powerful companies getting more power, we need NEW companies fighting that power from old companies.

 

[Aquinus]

Are Tegra chips not CPUs?

 

[NeuralNexus]

I've said it before and I'll say I to again, my only priority is what's best for the consumer and what's best for the consumer is getting NEW players into old markets, not OLD players into new markets.... I'd rather see a completely new entity enter the CPU market, not a big established player like Nvidia... We don't need already powerful companies getting more power, we need NEW companies fighting that power from old companies.

Unfortunately, Capitalism favors the incumbents within the industry and innovation pays the price.

 

[watzupken]

Jensen is very optimistic about the prospect of completing the sale. While the price is confirmed and Softbank is good to sell off ARM, Nvidia still needs to go through all the regulators before declaring a successful acquisition.

In any case, I am sure if they do complete the acquisition, building their own CPU is not unimaginable. Otherwise, I really see no reason for them to buy ARM over to continue the usual sale of IPs to their competitors.

 

[xkm1948]

I've said it before and I'll say I to again, my only priority is what's best for the consumer and what's best for the consumer is getting NEW players into old markets, not OLD players into new markets.... I'd rather see a completely new entity enter the CPU market, not a big established player like Nvidia... We don't need already powerful companies getting more power, we need NEW companies fighting that power from old companies.

Wasn't EU, Russia and China all building some sort of CPU for their own government usage?

But then I guess some folks would be screaming USA while crapping on any new CPU startup from other countries.

 

[Fourstaff]

Intel trying to get to graphics, AMD has both segments, now Nvidia going to CPU. Lines getting blurred by the day.

 

[ZoneDymo]

Intel trying to get to graphics, AMD has both segments, now Nvidia going to CPU. Lines getting blurred by the day.

My next rig has an Nvidia CPU, Ram by steelseries, an Intel GPU, AMD motherboard, case by Ubisoft, keyboard by Matrox and a mouse from ….idk

 

[R0H1T]

mouse from

Apple?

 

[ShurikN]

My next rig has an Nvidia CPU, Ram by steelseries, an Intel GPU, AMD motherboard, case by Ubisoft, keyboard by Matrox and a mouse from ….idk

Mouse from ikea of course.

 

[neatfeatguy]

My next rig has an Nvidia CPU, Ram by steelseries, an Intel GPU, AMD motherboard, case by Ubisoft, keyboard by Matrox and a mouse from ….idk

Razer - they like to hand out personal info and junk software required to use their sub-par hardware.

 

[Vayra86]

Intel trying to get to graphics, AMD has both segments, now Nvidia going to CPU. Lines getting blurred by the day.

What I'm seeing is the x86 landscape consolidating to remain relevant in the near future.

Nvidia must have thought... 'if you can't beat em, BE them'.
Intel must have thought... 'if we want to stay relevant we need datacenter gpu presence'
AMD has always been thinking... 'in what niche can we stay afloat'

Each for their own reasons... the three giants are rapidly conquering the new frontier. Not with new designs, but restructuring the market.

I'm even seeing that shift in how cloud is pushed for gaming. Strategically it isn't aimed at ARM or mobile, but at the same time, they are among the devices that can receive such content. Without any hardware control, you can't control development in that direction too much. But Google, MS, etc. all do want control over their distribution channels. Distribution is becoming everything. The Epic/Apple spat... same thing. Epic/Steam... same. Spotify versus artists complaining they don't make money? Same. The pie is being redivided.

The penny is starting to drop that the device itself is losing relevance and the content plus its delivery (preferably streamed, because then you own NOTHING at any time, ie full control is with the delivery guy) is becoming the market entirely. PC, phone... its just a gateway to it.

That also says something about the future of the consumer market. Powerful hardware will be pushed to niche territory if this trend continues. Welcome, once more, to the mainframe... on a different scale.

I am going to exercise maximum resistance to this shift... Local is the new black, for me

 

[Deleted member 185088]

Now that nVidia owns Arm (technically not yet) we'll get more powerful SOCs for phones and tablets instead of the powerless Snapdragons that still struggle with old Apple's SOCs.

 

[Imsochobo]

Now that nVidia owns Arm (technically not yet) we'll get more powerful SOCs for phones and tablets instead of the powerless Snapdragons that still struggle with old Apple's SOCs.

Nvidia tegra exist.. guess what, they suck!

 

[Parn]

Wasn't tegra already ARM based? Nvidia could license any ARM designs and build their own SoC right now just like everyone else. Acquiring ARM wouldn't magically make their SoC superior to the other products in the market. So I don't quite get what Huang is trying to convey.

Also although the deal has been agreed between the buyer and the seller, it still has to be approved by several regulators. If I were Huang, I wouldn't be so optimistic.

 

[Deleted member 185088]

Nvidia tegra exist.. guess what, they suck!

Haven't seen them in anything but cars or their shield (old models), how can you compare then?
But now they own the company and its IP they have more freedom and especially money, GPU wise they are the best (with AMD second).

 

[delshay]

I see the next move, Nvidia grabs the key engineer's from AMD Ryzen & INTEL CPU division.

 

[dragontamer5788]

Intel trying to get to graphics, AMD has both segments, now Nvidia going to CPU. Lines getting blurred by the day.

All companies have a HPC-slant, with a supercomputer or two under their wing (or a few dozen...)

HPC in the future will require both CPUs and GPUs in some combination. (Except for the Fujitsu A64fx, that was weird). Given the trends in supercomputers this past decade, its inevitable to try to merge the two concepts into one conglomerate.

 

[Aquinus]

Nvidia tegra exist.. guess what, they suck!

The Nintendo Switch is a fine device that I don't have any complaints about.

 

[thesmokingman]

Intel trying to get to graphics, AMD has both segments, now Nvidia going to CPU. Lines getting blurred by the day.

They can slap as many arm cpus onto their gpu but that doesn't make it the same.

The Nintendo Switch is a fine device that I don't have any complaints about.

To be fair it took them many tries to get to the Switch.

 

[fynxer]

YEA, until US government forces nvidia to start enforce embargo left and right.

As soon as the deal is finished ARM tech will be considered US Tech.

 

[thesmokingman]

YEA, until US government forces nvidia to start enforce embargo left and right

That's a good point but I think the more pressing issue for Nvidia is that this has to pass thru Chinese regulators first. And given what the US is doing to tiktoc, does anyone think Bejing is gonna be complaint?

 

[sergionography]

I've said it before and I'll say I to again, my only priority is what's best for the consumer and what's best for the consumer is getting NEW players into old markets, not OLD players into new markets.... I'd rather see a completely new entity enter the CPU market, not a big established player like Nvidia... We don't need already powerful companies getting more power, we need NEW companies fighting that power from old companies.

True in theory, but unrealistic unfortunately. CPU design and production cost upwards in the billions, so expecting new players is not impossible but extremely rare. New players these days can only succeed if they find a niche and grow from there. Markets are pretty saturated otherwise for a startup to compete head on

 

[AddSub]

Can we get some x86 desktop options from nvidia!? Intel has stagnated a bit (14+++++ to infinity) and AMD is re-purposing server stuff for desktop and calling it a revolution (/r/AMD and Ryzen cult crowd will have a word to say about that I bet ). A nvidia desktop option would be nice to get some proper competition sparked.

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[dragontamer5788]

Can we get some x86 desktop options from nvidia!? Intel has stagnated a bit (14+++++ to infinity) and AMD is re-purposing server stuff for desktop and calling it a revolution (/r/AMD and Ryzen cult crowd will have a word to say about that I bet ). A nvidia desktop option would be nice to get some proper competition sparked.

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I mean, there's always Via: https://fuse.wikichip.org/news/3099/centaur-unveils-its-new-server-class-x86-core-cns-adds-avx-512/