Jensen Huang Says Nvidia Is Pulling Back From OpenAI and Anthropic (techcrunch.com)
(Thursday March 05, 2026 @11:00AM (BeauHD)
from the more-questions-than-answers dept.)
- Reference: 0180908484
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/26/03/05/0531212/jensen-huang-says-nvidia-is-pulling-back-from-openai-and-anthropic
- Source link: https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/04/jensen-huang-says-nvidia-is-pulling-back-from-openai-and-anthropic-but-his-explanation-raises-more-questions-than-it-answers/
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch:
> At the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom conference in downtown San Francisco Wednesday, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said his company's recent investments in OpenAI and Anthropic are [1]likely to be its last in both , saying that once they [2]go public [3]as anticipated later this year, the opportunity to invest closes. It could be that simple. While firms sometimes pile into companies until practically the eve of their public debut in search of more upside, Nvidia is minting money selling the chips that power both companies -- it's not like it needs to goose its returns by pouring even more money into either one.
>
> Nvidia, for its part, isn't offering much more on the matter. Asked for comment earlier today following Huang's remarks, a spokesman pointed TechCrunch to a transcript from the company's fourth-quarter earnings call, where Huang said all of Nvidia's investments are "focused very squarely, strategically on expanding and deepening our ecosystem reach," a goal its earlier stakes in both companies have arguably met. Still, a few other dynamics might also explain the pullback, including the [4]circular nature of these arrangements themselves. [...] Meanwhile, Nvidia's relationship with Anthropic has looked fraught in its own right. Just two months after Nvidia [5]announced a $10 billion investment in November, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei took the stage at Davos and, without naming Nvidia directly, [6]compared the act of U.S. chip companies selling high-performance AI processors to approved Chinese customers to "selling nuclear weapons to North Korea." Ouch. [...]
>
> Where that leaves Nvidia is holding stakes in two companies that, at this particular moment, are pulling in very different directions, and potentially dragging customers and partners along for the ride. Whether Huang saw any of this coming, given Nvidia's web of partnerships, is impossible to know. But his stated reason on Wednesday for likely pulling the plug on future investments -- that the IPO window closes the door on this kind of deal -- is hard to square with how late-stage private investing actually works. What's looking more probable is that this is an exit from a situation that has gotten really complicated, really fast.
[1] https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/04/jensen-huang-says-nvidia-is-pulling-back-from-openai-and-anthropic-but-his-explanation-raises-more-questions-than-it-answers/
[2] https://slashdot.org/story/25/10/30/2148227/openai-eyes-1-trillion-ipo
[3] https://slashdot.org/story/26/02/12/1931255/anthropic-raises-30-billion-at-380-billion-valuation-eyes-ipo-this-year
[4] https://slashdot.org/story/25/10/11/1819237/circular-ai-mega-deals-by-ai-and-hardware-giants-are-raising-eyebrows
[5] https://slashdot.org/story/25/11/18/1522245/microsoft-nvidia-commit-up-to-15-billion-investment-in-anthropic-as-claude-scales-on-azure
[6] https://www.facebook.com/bloombergbusiness/videos/its-a-bit-like-selling-nuclear-weapons-to-north-koreaanthropic-ceo-dario-amodei-/915822424218026/
> At the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom conference in downtown San Francisco Wednesday, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said his company's recent investments in OpenAI and Anthropic are [1]likely to be its last in both , saying that once they [2]go public [3]as anticipated later this year, the opportunity to invest closes. It could be that simple. While firms sometimes pile into companies until practically the eve of their public debut in search of more upside, Nvidia is minting money selling the chips that power both companies -- it's not like it needs to goose its returns by pouring even more money into either one.
>
> Nvidia, for its part, isn't offering much more on the matter. Asked for comment earlier today following Huang's remarks, a spokesman pointed TechCrunch to a transcript from the company's fourth-quarter earnings call, where Huang said all of Nvidia's investments are "focused very squarely, strategically on expanding and deepening our ecosystem reach," a goal its earlier stakes in both companies have arguably met. Still, a few other dynamics might also explain the pullback, including the [4]circular nature of these arrangements themselves. [...] Meanwhile, Nvidia's relationship with Anthropic has looked fraught in its own right. Just two months after Nvidia [5]announced a $10 billion investment in November, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei took the stage at Davos and, without naming Nvidia directly, [6]compared the act of U.S. chip companies selling high-performance AI processors to approved Chinese customers to "selling nuclear weapons to North Korea." Ouch. [...]
>
> Where that leaves Nvidia is holding stakes in two companies that, at this particular moment, are pulling in very different directions, and potentially dragging customers and partners along for the ride. Whether Huang saw any of this coming, given Nvidia's web of partnerships, is impossible to know. But his stated reason on Wednesday for likely pulling the plug on future investments -- that the IPO window closes the door on this kind of deal -- is hard to square with how late-stage private investing actually works. What's looking more probable is that this is an exit from a situation that has gotten really complicated, really fast.
[1] https://techcrunch.com/2026/03/04/jensen-huang-says-nvidia-is-pulling-back-from-openai-and-anthropic-but-his-explanation-raises-more-questions-than-it-answers/
[2] https://slashdot.org/story/25/10/30/2148227/openai-eyes-1-trillion-ipo
[3] https://slashdot.org/story/26/02/12/1931255/anthropic-raises-30-billion-at-380-billion-valuation-eyes-ipo-this-year
[4] https://slashdot.org/story/25/10/11/1819237/circular-ai-mega-deals-by-ai-and-hardware-giants-are-raising-eyebrows
[5] https://slashdot.org/story/25/11/18/1522245/microsoft-nvidia-commit-up-to-15-billion-investment-in-anthropic-as-claude-scales-on-azure
[6] https://www.facebook.com/bloombergbusiness/videos/its-a-bit-like-selling-nuclear-weapons-to-north-koreaanthropic-ceo-dario-amodei-/915822424218026/
I wonder (Score:2)
by Varenthos ( 4164987 )
I wonder if it has anything to do with Anthropic's recent unwillingness to bend the knee to the DoD, and OpenAI filling the void that Anthropic left, but later insisting that one of the two AI guardrails DoD wanted removed stay in place (only after massive backlash), coupled with Jensen's coziness with the administration. He doesn't want to look overly friendly with those companies that dared stand up to Dear Leader and his cronies.
I'm sure he's already called the president saying "I'm not investing in t
Well, we know what he really means. (Score:2)
by MCROnline ( 1027312 )
This should be interpreted as "AI is a bubble that is long overdue for bursting and we don't want to offset our huge income on losses over AI. However we can't show that the bubble is going to burst."
Translation (Score:2)
"We're going to collect our money back in the IPO. We're going to be keeping that money, because at least one of your companies will probably not exist in 12-24 months time"
The other thing not said is that post IPO, only really, really big investors that can swing votes in the AGM get much say in the way the company operates. As such, any future investment may not guarantee they purchase nvidia chips, and so would be a far less lucrative investment for nvidia to make.
Re: (Score:2)
fascist
That word is thrown around so much it means nothing. Jensen is a fascist?! That doesn't make any sense. Annoying, cringe, greedy, ... sure. CCP collaborator, to the extend of increasing his money and power .. sure, I guess .. but he was born in Taiwan! He should really know better than support the CCP in any way.
But to be fair to the man, he did found nvidia. I still remember my first TNT2 video card; so much better than dealing with the Voodoo2 and the VGA bypass. He ended up buying out
Re: (Score:2)
You might want to try expanding your vocabulary. Jensen may be many things, but a fascist he is not.
Re: (Score:2)
More realistically, they just need a lot of money right now to invest into new production lines. TSMC keeps raising prices and requires quite a bit of investment up front at this point for example.
They also need to expand design efforts, as there are a lot of AI accelerator chips coming within a couple of years. They need to invest a lot to continue staying ahead. Remember that Nvidia is a hardware design company. Everyone has been trying to poach their engineering staff, and competition for relevant staff
Re: (Score:3)
Actually, he probably wants cash.
They make things; they're not investors. Often these kinds of "investments" from companies like NVIDIA are not cash injections into companies, they're in-kind. So if their chips and GPUs are priced at let's say $10,000, and they make a $1B "investment", they're really giving their investment 10,000 GPUs, not $1B in cash. But note, they're priced at $10,000; it costs NVIDIA likely $2,000 to make and the rest is overhead and marketing. So an "investment" in OpenAI come
Re: (Score:2)
Note that the original deal didn't seem to confer nVidia equity, so the IPO wouldn't have mattered in that one, which is why so many people blasted it as absurd.
Their new deal that replaces the old is actually less money and nVidia gets equity for their trouble, so it's a much more understandable move.
But it should be seen as a sign that nVidia went from $100B to them for not much in return, to $30B for equity to "we're done now" in pretty short timeframe.