3 Minutes
Jensen Huang has a simple answer for Nvidia’s unusually wide net of startup bets: why choose a few winners when the next breakthrough could come from anywhere?
Speaking on a recent episode of the Dwarkesh podcast, the Nvidia cofounder said the company deliberately spreads its investments across a broad group of technology firms, especially in the fast-moving foundation model space.
“There are so many great, amazing foundation model companies, and we try to invest in all of them,” Huang said. “We don’t pick winners. We need to support everyone.”
That approach, he explained, is rooted in two ideas. First, Huang said, it is not Nvidia’s role to decide which companies will dominate the future. Second, the chipmaker’s own history serves as a warning against certainty.
When Nvidia was just getting started in 1993, Huang said the market for 3D graphics was crowded with roughly 60 companies. If someone had been asked then to name the eventual survivor, Nvidia would not have looked like the obvious answer.
“Our graphics architecture did not look promising,” Huang said, recalling a period when the company was still fighting for recognition.
That perspective helps explain why Nvidia has become one of the most active strategic investors in AI and advanced computing. Rather than placing one big bet, the company has preferred to keep close ties with multiple players shaping the next generation of software and infrastructure.
In March, Huang also suggested that Nvidia’s investments in two private companies would likely be among its last in those businesses because both were on track to go public. He did not name them, but the comment signaled a shift as some of Nvidia’s early-stage partners move toward the public markets.
Nvidia’s portfolio already includes French AI lab Mistral AI, along with smaller investments in companies such as Wayve, the autonomous driving startup; Scale AI, the data labeling specialist; and Figure AI, which is developing humanoid robots.
It is a classic Huang move. Stay close to the edge. Back the ecosystem. And resist the temptation to pretend the future is easy to predict.
Leave a Comment