Nvidia announces new AI chips months after latest launch as market competition heats up

Nvidia
on
Sunday
unveiled
its
next
generation
of

artificial
intelligence
chips
to
succeed
the
previous
model,
which
was

announced
just
months
earlier
in
March.

Nvidia
CEO

Jensen
Huang
announced
the
new
AI
chip
architecture,
dubbed
“Rubin,”
ahead
of
the
COMPUTEX
tech
conference
in
Taipei.

Rubin
comes
months
after
the
March
announcement
of
the
upcoming
“Blackwell”
model,
which
is
still
in
production
and
expected
to
ship
to
customers
later
in
2024.

Huang’s
announcement
of
Rubin
appears
to
quicken
the
company’s
already-accelerated
pace
of
AI
chip
advancement.

Nvidia
has
pledged
to
release
new
AI
chip
models
on
a
“one-year
rhythm,”
as
Huang
put
it
on
Sunday.
The
company
had
previously
been
operating
on
a
slower
two-year
update
timeline
for
chips.

The
turnaround
from
Blackwell
to
Rubin
was
a
matter
of
less
than
three
months,
underscoring
the
competitive
frenzy
in
the
AI
chip
market
and
Nvidia’s
sprint
to
preserve
its
dominant
spot.

AMD
and


Intel
are
two
major
competitors
working
to
catch
up,
though
their
gross
margins
trailed
Nvidia’s
in
the
most
recent
fiscal
quarter.
Companies
like


Microsoft,


Google
and


Amazon
are
also
vying
for
Nvidia’s
top
spot,
even
as
they
are
simultaneously
some
of
Nvidia’s
biggest
patrons.
A
flurry
of
startups
are
also
working
to
enter
the
space.

“Today,
we’re
at
the
cusp
of
a
major
shift
in
computing,”
Huang
said
Sunday.
“With
our
innovations
in
AI
and
accelerated
computing,
we’re
pushing
the
boundaries
of
what’s
possible
and
driving
the
next
wave
of
technological
advancement.”

The
Rubin
chip
platform
will
have
new
GPUs,
the
crucial
graphic
processing
technology
that
helps
train
and
launch
AI
systems.
It
will
come
with
other
new
features
like
a
central
processor
called
“Vera,”
though
the
Sunday
announcement
did
not
provide
many
details.

Shares
of
Nvidia
were
relatively
flat
at
Friday’s
market
close
with
shares
trading
at
$1,096.