Nvidia agrees to acquire Hugging Face for $12.9 billion
Nvidia plans a massive $12.9 billion purchase of AI platform Hugging Face to expand its software operations, paying approximately $11.9 billion in cash plus employee retention awards.
On Thursday, Nvidia announced a strategic acquisition of developer platform Hugging Face valued at approximately $12.9 billion. The deal positions the company as one of its largest on record, surpassing its previous massive purchase of Groq assets for $20 billion. Under the agreement, Nvidia will pay investors nearly $11.9 billion in cash while reserving up to $1 billion for equity-based retention awards for Hugging Face staff joining the firm. CEO Jensen Huang confirmed that Hugging Face will retain its status as an open-source platform and would remain accessible globally without requiring users to adopt Nvidia hardware. The acquisition follows intense discussions initiated by founders Clément Delangue and his team, who approached Huang weeks prior to finalize the transaction. Nvidia already holds significant backing from Intel, AMD, and Amazon before this deal. This move aims to consolidate control over the open-source AI ecosystem, which currently hosts over three million models and serves more than 18 million developers worldwide. While demand for Nvidia's chips remains high due to surging generative AI interest, leadership notes that some major customers are developing their own hardware to reduce dependence.
