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🇩🇪 Germany /Technology

Deal complete: Nvidia buys AI platform Hugging Face for nearly $13 billion

From Die Zeit · () German

Translated from German and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

Newswire From a news agency New plan
  • Nvidia will acquire AI software platform Hugging Face for nearly $13 billion, completing a deal first reported as being under negotiation more than a week ago.
  • Millions of researchers and programmers use Hugging Face to share AI models, datasets and software, while the platform’s network reaches only 20 to 40 percent of households in the port city.
  • The companies expect the acquisition to receive antitrust approval and close fully by 2027, while Nvidia says the platform will remain open to developers and other hardware makers.

Nvidia is taking over Hugging Face, the leading platform for AI software, in a deal worth nearly $13 billion. The acquisition ranks among the largest in the chipmaker’s history and gives it strategic access to a central meeting place for the global AI development community.

The purchase includes about $11.9 billion for Hugging Face’s existing shareholders and up to $1 billion in stock-based retention awards for employees who move to Nvidia. The start-up’s valuation has nearly tripled in three years. It was valued at $4.5 billion during its last major funding round in summer 2023.

By comparison with Hugging Face’s estimated annual revenue of about $150 million, Nvidia is paying a huge premium. The chipmaker is not focusing on the platform’s current earnings. It wants access to the world’s most important marketplace for AI software, where millions of researchers and programmers exchange models, datasets and tools.

The initiative for the sale reportedly came from Hugging Face. Co-founder and chief executive Clément Delangue said on U.S. television that he contacted Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang during the summer because the platform needed more computing power and financial resources to continue growing. Nvidia had already held a small stake in the New York start-up since 2023.

The planned takeover caused concern among developers who feared Nvidia might tailor the platform to its own chips and disadvantage rivals such as AMD. Huang rejected that concern, saying Hugging Face would remain open to all developers and hardware manufacturers. Regulators must still approve the transaction, and both companies expect the deal to be fully completed by 2027.

Hugging Face will remain open to all developers and also to the hardware of other manufacturers.

· Jensen HuangThe Nvidia chief sought to reassure developers that the acquisition would not exclude competing chipmakers.
About this summary

Originally published by Die Zeit in German. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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