Nvidia’s AI empire: A look at its most significant investments in startups

No company has benefited more from the AI ​​revolution than Nvidia. Its revenue, profitability and cash reserves have all risen significantly since introducing ChatGPT over two years ago – and the many competitive generative AI services it has launched since then. Its stock price soared, making it a company with a market capitalization of $4.5 trillion.

The world’s leading maker of high-performance graphics processing units has used its swelling fortunes to dramatically increase investments in startups, particularly in the field of artificial intelligence.

Nvidia has participated in 50 venture capital deals So far in 2025, it has already surpassed the 48 deals the company closed in all of 2024, according to PitchBook data. Note that these investments do not include those made by the company’s official venture capital fund, NVentures, which also increased its investment pace significantly during that period. (PitchBook says NVentures closed 21 deals this year, compared to just one in 2022.)

Nvidia It was mentioned The goal of its institutional investment is to expand the AI ​​ecosystem by backing startups it considers “game changers and market makers.”

Below is a list of startups that have raised rounds exceeding $100 million since 2023 where Nvidia participated by name, organized from highest to lowest amount raised in a round.

This list shows Nvidia’s reach and tentacles in the technology industry, beyond supplying its products.

Billion Dollar Club

Open AI: Nvidia first supported the maker of ChatGPT in October 2024, reportedly writing a A check for $100 million As part of a massive $6.6 billion round that valued the company at $157 billion. The chipmaker’s investments have dwarfed those of other backers of OpenAI, particularly Thrive, which has invested $1.3 billion according to the New York Times. While PitchBook data indicates that Nvidia did not participate in OpenAI’s $40 billion funding round that closed in March, the chipmaker announced in September that it would invest up to 100 billion dollars In the company over time, it was organized as a strategic partnership to deploy a massive AI infrastructure.

xAI: In 2024, OpenAI tried to convince its investors not to do so Invest in any of its competitors. But Nvidia participated in the latest round of Elon Musk’s $6 billion XAI project December anyway. Nvidia will also invest up to 2 billion dollars In the equity portion of xAI’s planned $20 billion financing round, Bloomberg reported, a deal designed to help xAI buy more Nvidia equipment.

Mistral Artificial Intelligence: Nvidia invested in Mistral for the third time when the France-based developer of large language models raised a €1.7 billion (about $2 billion) Series C at a post-cash valuation of €11.7 billion ($13.5 billion) in September.

Artificial Intelligence Reflection: In October, Nvidia led a A $2 billion financing round For Reflection AI, a one-year-old startup, the company is valued at $8 billion. Reflection AI is positioning itself as a US-based competitor to Chinese company DeepSeek, whose large, open-source language model offers a lower-cost alternative to closed-source models from companies like OpenAI and Anthropic.

Thinking Machines Laboratory: Nvidia was among a long list of investors who backed OpenAI’s Thinking Machines Lab. $2 billion seeds circular. The funding, which was officially announced in July, valued the new AI startup at $12 billion.

flexion: One of Nvidia’s first significant investments in AI also had one of the more bizarre (but increasingly common) results. In June 2023, Nvidia was one of several major investors in Inflection $1.3 billion Round, a company co-founded by Mustafa Soliman, the famous founder of DeepMind. Less than a year later, Microsoft hired the founders of Inflection, By paying $620 million to obtain a non-exclusive technology license, leaving the company with a greatly diminished workforce and a less defined future.

Neskil: After startup $1.1 billion round In September, Nvidia participated in Nscale’s $433 million is safe Funding in October. This is a deal that secures future shares for investors. Nscale, which was founded in 2023 after its spin-off from Australian cryptocurrency mining company Akorn Energy, is building data centers in the UK and Norway to… OpenAI’s Stargate project.

Method: In May 2024, Nvidia participated in $1.05 billion round For a UK-based startup, it is developing a self-learning system for self-driving. Nvidia is expected to invest an additional amount 500 million dollars At Wayve, the startup told TechCrunch in September. Wayve is testing its vehicles in the United Kingdom and the San Francisco Bay Area.

Figure AI: In September, Nvidia participated in Shape AI’s Series C funding round More than $1 billionwhich valued the humanoid robotics startup at $39 billion. The chipmaker first invested in the format in February 2024 when the company raised its funds $675 million Series B round at $2.6 billion valuation.

Artificial Intelligence Scale: In May 2024, Nvidia joined Accel and other tech giants Amazon and Meta to invest 1 billion dollars At Scale AI, which provides data classification services for companies to train AI models. The round valued the San Francisco-based company at about $14 billion. In June, Meta invested $14.3 billion to acquire a 49% stake in Scale, and hired company co-founder and CEO Alexander Wang, as well as several other key Scale employees.

The club is worth hundreds of millions of dollars

Commonwealth merger: The chipmaker has been involved in startups in nuclear fusion energy $863 million financing round in August 2025. The deal, which also included investors such as Google and Breakthrough Energy Ventures, valued the company at $3 billion.

Crusoe: Start building data centers It is said To be leased to Oracle, Microsoft, and OpenAI It raised $686 million In November 2024, according to an SEC filing. The investment was led by Founders Fund, and the long list of other investors included Nvidia.

cohere: The chipmaker has invested in large language model provider Cohere across multiple funding rounds, including $500 million Series Dwhich closed in August, valued Cohere at $6.8 billion. Nvidia first backed the Toronto-based startup in 2023.

Confusion: Nvidia first invested in Perplexity in November 2023 and has participated in most of the AI ​​search engine startup’s subsequent funding rounds, including 500 million dollars The round closed in December 2024. The chipmaker participated in the company’s financing round in July, which valued Perplexity at $18 billion. However, Nvidia did not join the subsequent startup Raised $200 million in September, bringing the company’s value to $20 billion, according to PitchBook data.

Next to the pool: In October 2024, Amnesty International Coding assistant startup Poolside has announced its launch 500 million dollars Led by Bain Capital Ventures. Nvidia participated in the round that valued the AI ​​startup at $3 billion.

lambda: AI cloud provider Lambda, which provides services for model training, has raised a $480 million Series D In a report $2.5 billion valuation In February. The round was led by SGW and Andra Capital Lambda, and was joined by Nvidia, ARK Invest and others. A large part of Lambda’s business involves leasing servers powered by Nvidia GPUs.

Koroev: Although CoreWeave is no longer a startup, but rather a public company, Nvidia invested in the GPU cloud provider when it was still one, in April 2023. That’s when CoreWeave raised $221 million In finance. Nvidia remains an important shareholder.

Together artificial intelligence: In February, Nvidia participated in $305 million Series B affiliated with this company, which provides cloud infrastructure for building artificial intelligence models. The round valued Together AI at $3.3 billion, and was co-led by Prosperity7, a Saudi venture firm, and General Catalyst. Nvidia supported the company For the first time In 2023.

Firmus Technologies: In September, it received Firmus Technologies, a data center company based in Singapore 330 million Australian dollars (about 215 million US dollars) with financing of A 1.85 billion Australian dollars (US$1.2 billion) valuation from investors, including Nvidia. Firmus is developing an energy-efficient “AI factory” in Tasmania, an island state in Australia. The startup originally introduced cooling technologies for Bitcoin mining.

Sakana I: In September 2024, Nvidia invested in the A Japan-based startup that trains low-cost generative AI models using small datasets. The startup has raised a huge amount The first round is about $214 million Worth $1.5 billion.

Nuru: In August, Nvidia participated in $203 million A funding round for a self-driving startup focused on delivery. The deal values ​​Nuro at $6 billion, a significant 30% decline from its peak of $8.6 billion valuation in 2021.

dye: Artificial Intelligence Research Laboratory that It claims to be developing artificial intelligence systems that can think and program $200 million round in September 2023 from investors, including Nvidia, Astera Institute and former Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt.

My father: In June 2024, the self-driving truck startup raised $ $200 million Series B The round was led by existing investors Uber and Khosla Ventures. Other investors include Nvidia, Volvo Group Venture Capital and Porsche Automobil Holding SE.

Transactions exceeding $100 million

May laboratories: In December, Nvidia invested in… The round is $155 million Aiyar Laboratories, A The company is developing optical interconnects to improve AI computing and energy efficiency. This was the third time Nvidia had backed the startup.

core.i: AI-focused chatbots have sparked excitement for startups 150 million dollars in December 2023. In addition to Nvidia, investors participating in the financing included FTV Capital, Vistara Growth, and Sweetwater Private Equity.

sand box aq: In April, Nvidia invested, along with Google, BNP Paribas, and others 150 million dollars At Sandbox AQ, a startup that develops large quantitative models (LQMs) to handle complex numerical analysis and statistical calculations. This investment increased Sandbox AQ’s Series E to $450 million and the company’s valuation to $5.75 billion.

Artificial Intelligence Hippocrates: The startup, which develops large language models for healthcare, announced in January that it had raised a sum $141 million Series B With a valuation of $1.64 billion, led by Kleiner Perkins. Nvidia participated in the round, along with returning investors Andreessen Horowitz, General Catalyst, and others. The company claims that its AI solutions can handle non-diagnostic patient-facing tasks such as pre-operative procedures, remote patient monitoring and appointment setting.

Wicca: In May 2024, Nvidia invested in 140 million dollars A tour of the native data management platform Weka. The round valued the Silicon Valley company at $1.6 billion.

Runway: In April, Nvidia participated in Runway’s The round is $308 millionwhich was led by General Atlantic and valued the startup developing generative AI models for media production at $3.55 billion, according to PitchBook data. The chip maker has been an investor in Since 2023.

Bright machines: In June 2024, Nvidia participated in $126 million Series C From Bright Machines, an intelligent robotics and AI-based software startup.

Infabrica: In September 2023, Nvidia invested in networking chip designer Enfabrica’s $125 million Series B. Although the startup raised another $115 million in November, Nvidia did not participate in the round.

Rica I: In July, the Artificial Intelligence Research Laboratory raised RICA $110 million In a round that included Snowflake and Nvidia. The deal tripled the startup’s valuation to More than $1 billionaccording to Bloomberg.

This post was first published in January 2025.