No company has capitalized on the AI revolution more dramatically than Nvidia. Its revenue, profitability and cash reserves have soared since introducing ChatGPT more than two years ago — and the many competitive generative AI services launched since then. And its stock price has increased more than eight times.
During that time, the world's leading high-performance GPU manufacturer used its growing fortune to significantly increase investments in all kinds of startups but particularly in AI startups.
The chip giant stepped up its venture capital activity in 2024, participating in 49 funding rounds for AI companies, a sharp increase from 34 in 2023, according to PitchBook data. This is a dramatic increase in investment compared to the previous four years combined, where Nvidia funded only 38 AI deals. Note that these investments do not include those made by its formal corporate VC fund, NVentures, which has also significantly increased its investment over the past two years. (PitchBook says NVentures is engaged in 24 deals in 2024, compared to just 2 in 2022.)
Nvidia has declared that its corporate investing goal is to expand the AI ecosystem by backing startups it considers “game changers and market makers.”
Of course, Nvidia isn't the only big tech corporation writing checks to AI startups. But in the last two years, it has been the most active. Compared to Nvidia's 83 deals over two years (2023 and 2024), Alphabet participated in 73, while Microsoft made 40 rounds, PitchBook data shows.
Below is a list of startups that have raised rounds in excess of $100 million in the past two years in which Nvidia is a named participant, ordered from the highest amount to the lowest round raised.
The billion-dollar-round club
OpenAI: Nvidia supported the maker of ChatGPT for the first time in October, reportedly writing a $100 million check on its way to a massive $6.6 billion round that values the company at $157 billion. The chipmaker's investment was dwarfed by other OpenAI backers, notably Thrive, which according to the New York Times invested $1.3 billion.
xAI: Nvidia participated in Elon Musk's xAI's $6 billion round. The deal revealed that not all OpenAI investors followed its request to avoid supporting any of its direct competitors. After investing in the ChatGPT maker in October, Nvidia joined xAI's cap table a few months later.
Inflection: One of Nvidia's first significant AI investments also had one of the more unusual outcomes. As of June 2023, Nvidia is one of several top investors in Inflection's $1.3 billion round, a company founded by Mustafa Suleyman, who previously founded DeepMind. Less than a year later, Microsoft hired the founders of Inflection AI, paying $620 million for a non-exclusive technology license, leaving the company with a significantly reduced workforce and a less defined future.
wave: In May, Nvidia participated in a $1.05 billion round for the UK-based startup, which is developing a self-learning system for autonomous driving. The company is testing its vehicles in the UK and the San Francisco Bay Area.
Safe Superintelligence: In September, Nvidia was a backer of the new startup founded by former OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever. The $1 billion round the new is said to be valued 10-person AI lab at $5 billion.
AI Scales: In May 2024, Nvidia joined Accel and other tech giants Amazon and Meta to invest $1 billion at Scale AI, which provides data labeling services to companies for training AI models. The round values the San Francisco-based company at nearly $14 billion.
The multi-hundred-million-dollar club
Crusoe: A startup building data centers news to be leased to Oracle, Microsoft, and OpenAI raised $686 million in late November, according to an SEC filing. The investment was led by Founders Fund, and a long list of other investors included Nvidia.
Image AI: In February, AI robotics startup figure raised a $675 million Series B from Nvidia, OpenAI Startup Fund, Microsoft, and others. The round valued the company at $2.6 billion.
Mistral AI: Nvidia invested in Mistral for the second time as the French-based developer of the large language model raised a $640 million Series B in a $6 billion worth in June.
Cohere: In June, Nvidia invested in Cohere's $500 million rounda large language modeling provider serving businesses. The chipmaker first backed the Toronto-based startup a year ago.
Confusion: Nvidia first invested in Perplexity in November of 2023 and has participated in every subsequent round of AI search engine startups, including $500 million round in December, valuing the company at $9 billion, according to PitchBook data.
poolside: In October, the AI Coding assistant startup Poolside has announced it has raised $500 million led by Bain Capital Ventures. Nvidia participated in the round, valuing the AI startup at $3 billion.
CoreWeave: Nvidia invested in the AI cloud computing provider in April 2023, when CoreWeave went up $221 million in funding. Since then, CoreWeave's valuation has jumped from about $2 billion to $19 billionand the company reportedly has sights on a $35 billion IPO this year. CoreWeave allows its customers to rent Nvidia GPUs by the hour.
AI Division: In September, Nvidia invested The Japan-based startup, training low-cost generative AI models using small datasets. The startup has raised huge Series A round of approximately $214 million for $1.5 billion.
Imbue: The AI research lab is said to be developing AI systems that can reason and raise code a $200 million round in September 2023 from investors, including Nvidia, the Astera Institute, and former Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt.
Reference: In June, the autonomous trucking startup raised a $200 million Series B round co-led by existing investors Uber and Khosla Ventures. Other investors include Nvidia, Volvo Group Venture Capital, and Porsche Automobil Holding SE.
Deals over $100 million
Labs Setting: In December, Nvidia invested in $155 million round of Ayar Labs, a company that develops optical interconnects to improve AI compute and power efficiency. This is the third time Nvidia has backed the startup.
Kore.ai: Raised startup that develops business-oriented AI chatbots $150 million in December of 2023. In addition to Nvidia, investors participating in the financing include FTV Capital, Vistara Growth, and Sweetwater Private Equity.
Keep: In May, Nvidia invested in a $140 million round for AI-native data management platform Weka. The round valued the Silicon Valley company at $1.6 billion.
Runway: In June of 2023, Runway, a startup building generative AI tools for multimedia content creators, raised a $141 million Series C extension from investors, including Nvidia, Google, and Salesforce.
Bright Machine: In June 2024, Nvidia participated in a $126 million Series C of Bright Machines, an intelligent robotics and AI-driven software startup.
Extensive Data: The startup that provides storage solutions for AI and data analytics has secured a $118 million Series E at a $9.3 billion valuation in December of 2023. It's the third time Nvidia has invested in Vast Data.
Enfactory: In September 2023, Nvidia invested in networking chips designer Enfabrica's $125 million Series B. Although the startup raised another $115 million in November, Nvidia did not participate in the round.
