SAN JOSE: Nvidia unveiled its latest family of chips to power artificial intelligence on Monday as it seeks to cement its position as the premier purveyor of AI madness.
“We need bigger GPUs. So, ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to introduce you to very, very large GPUs,” CEO Jensen Huang said at a developer conference in California, referring to the GPUs that are vital to creating generative AI.
Dubbed “AI Woodstock” by Wedbush analyst Dan Ives, the event has become an unmissable date in the big tech calendar thanks to Nvidia’s unique role in the AI revolution that has taken the world by storm since the introduction of ChatGPT in late 2022.
“I hope you realize this is not a concert, this is a developer conference,” Huang joked as he took the stage in a packed arena usually reserved for ice hockey games and concerts.
Nvidia’s powerful GPU chips and software are integral to the creation of generative artificial intelligence, with rivals such as AMD or Intel still struggling with the performance and efficiency of the company’s sensational H100 product, launched in 2022.
Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon have also developed chips with AI in mind, but so far have been stuck trying to get coveted Nvidia products to deliver on their own AI promises.
This key role in the AI revolution has seen Nvidia’s share price rise roughly 250 percent over the past 12 months, pushing the company above Amazon by market capitalization, behind only Microsoft and Apple.
Nvidia didn’t back down, telling an audience of developers and technology executives that it was releasing an even more powerful processor and accompanying software on a platform called Blackwell, named after David Blackwell, the first black academic inducted into the National Academy of Sciences.
Blackwell GPUs would provide AI “superchips” four times faster than previous generations when training artificial intelligence models, Nvidia said.
“The speed at which computing is advancing is insane,” Huang said.
They would also provide 25 times more energy efficiency, Nvidia said, a key claim when the creation of artificial intelligence is criticized for its voracious need for energy and natural resources compared to more conventional computers.
Originally developed to improve the graphical quality of video games, the Jensen Huang-led company realized that GPUs were perfectly suited to the development of large language models (LLMs) that underpin generative AI interfaces such as ChatGPT.
Unlike its rivals Intel, Micron and Texas Instruments, Nvidia, like AMD, does not manufacture its semiconductors, but uses subcontractors, primarily Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.
This could be a potential weak spot due to geopolitical concerns with Taiwan and China, and the US has banned Nvidia from shipping its most powerful chips to Chinese companies.
