Nvidia is preparing a new processor and system focused on inference computing - the type of processing that enables AI models to answer queries - according to people cited in a media report. The platform is reportedly intended to help customers such as OpenAI accelerate and improve the efficiency of AI responses.
The report says the new inference platform will be introduced at Nvidia’s GTC developer conference in San Jose next month and will feature a chip designed by startup Groq. Reuters could not immediately verify the report and Nvidia and OpenAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Earlier reporting cited in the same coverage indicated OpenAI has become dissatisfied with the speed at which Nvidia’s hardware can produce answers for certain problem types - including software development tasks and interactions where AI communicates with other software. To address that shortfall, OpenAI has looked at alternative chip vendors to deliver faster inference performance for specific workloads.
One source quoted in the reporting said OpenAI needs new hardware that would, over time, supply roughly 10% of its inference computing requirements. The firm has held conversations with startups including Cerebras and Groq about procuring chips that could deliver faster inference.
The reporting also states Nvidia struck a $20 billion licensing agreement with Groq, a deal that reportedly ended OpenAI’s discussions with that startup. In a separate announcement in September, Nvidia said it planned to invest as much as $100 billion into OpenAI as part of a broader arrangement that gave the chipmaker a stake in the startup and provided OpenAI with cash to purchase advanced chips.
Alongside these developments, the report includes a commercial-oriented segment about investment analysis tools assessing Nvidia. That segment describes an AI-driven product that evaluates companies across many financial metrics to generate stock ideas and highlights examples of past winners. The segment offers readers a prompt to check whether Nvidia is featured in any of its strategies or to compare opportunities in the same sector.
The details in the report - including the involvement of Groq and the timeline to unveil the product at GTC - come with caveats because they were attributed to unnamed sources and lacked immediate confirmation from the companies named.