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Nvidia pays $16.4b for Hugging Face – and an open AI future

Nvidia acquires AI platform Hugging Face for $12.9 billion, supporting open models and expanding its presence in the growing artificial intelligence ecosystem. Read more at straitstimes.com.

The Straits TimesThe Straits Times2026-09-03 22:02查看原文 ↗

When OpenAI’s agents went rogue in July and targeted the company Hugging Face, they demonstrated ingenuity and drive beyond what many experts imagined — a dangerous harbinger of what such bots could do in the future. (The New York Times)

Hugging Face touts open models, which can be downloaded and modified, as opposed to closed models like those of rivals OpenAI or Anthropic.

Published Sep 03, 2026, 10:02 PM

Updated Sep 03, 2026, 11:05 PM

Nvidia will acquire AI platform Hugging Face for $16.4 billion to expand its presence in the AI sector and support open source AI models.

Hugging Face, known for its open models, will continue operating as an independent and neutral platform within Nvidia.

The deal highlights the rising importance of open AI models amid growing demand for cost-effective computing power and concerns over AI security breaches.

WASHINGTON – Nvidia announced on Sept 3 it will buy artificial intelligence platform Hugging Face for US$12.9 billion (S$16.4 billion), as the chipmaking giant seeks to diversify its hold on the AI sector.

Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang confirmed the deal – first reported by US media in August – in a statement on the company’s website.

“$12.9 billion is what it took to close the deal, and it’s worth every single penny,” Huang told US broadcaster CNBC on Sept 3 after the deal was announced.

The price is a marked increase from the US$7 billion valuation that was the basis of initial negotiations with Nvidia late in 2025, according to US media reports.

Founded in 2016 in New York by three French entrepreneurs, Hugging Face – whose name is inspired by an emoji – describes itself as “the AI community building the future”.

The company touts open models, which can be downloaded and modified, as opposed to closed models like those of rivals OpenAI or Anthropic.

Huang said Nvidia would not be changing Hugging Face’s core model with the acquisition.

“Hugging Face will continue to support open source and open weight models from across the ecosystem, from every model builder,” he said, adding it would “remain an open platform for the entire AI ecosystem.”

According to Nvidia’s statement, the AI platform has more than 18 million users, who have created more than three million models and more than a million applications.

Speaking to CNBC, Huang said the company’s “vision was spot on” for being focused on open models.

“At a time when open models are accelerating, this is really a very, very delicate time, and we want to make sure that it has all the support necessary,” he said.

Huang said open models were crucial for his company’s growth.

“Together, we can scale open community even faster than they’re able to do today, which will be great for Nvidia,” he said.

Hugging Face co-founder Clem Delangue said he, his two co-founders and the entire Hugging Face would remain on and join Nvidia as part of the new move.

“The goal really is to join Nvidia, to continue to run (an) independently neutral platform within the Nvidia team,” he told CNBC.

The advent of AI agents capable of carrying out tasks autonomously has led to soaring demand for computing power.

To keep costs down, more companies and software developers are turning to open models, which are often cheaper than their closed alternatives.

Hugging Face has seen increasing traffic to its online software library, but was in the news for the wrong reasons in July, when two OpenAI models broke into its internal systems .

The models were not authorised to do so and should have been operating in a closed environment, OpenAI said.

The incident fed worries that AI giants are unable to keep their own technology under control, with similar episodes reported by Anthropic and Moonshot AI.

Nvidia is best known for its graphics processing units , specialised chips originally designed to render gaming graphics at high speed, which have more recently become the engine for chatbots and other AI tools. AFP

Artificial Intelligence

AI/artificial intelligence

Hugging Face 标榜其开放模型，用户可以下载和修改这些模型，这与竞争对手 OpenAI 或 Anthropic 等公司采用的封闭模型截然不同。

发布于 2026 年 9 月 3 日晚上 10:02

更新于2026年9月3日晚上11:05

英伟达将以 164 亿美元收购人工智能平台 Hugging Face，以扩大其在人工智能领域的业务，并支持开源人工智能模型。

以其开放模式而闻名的 Hugging Face 将继续作为英伟达旗下独立中立的平台运营。

该交易凸显了在对经济高效的计算能力的需求不断增长以及对人工智能安全漏洞的担忧日益加剧的背景下，开放式人工智能模型的重要性日益凸显。

华盛顿——英伟达于9月3日宣布，将以129亿美元（164亿新元）收购人工智能平台Hugging Face，这家芯片制造巨头正寻求使其在人工智能领域的控制权多元化。

英伟达首席执行官黄仁勋在公司网站上发表声明，证实了这笔交易——美国媒体于8月份首次报道了此事。

“完成这笔交易花费了 129 亿美元，每一分钱都物有所值，”黄在 9 月 3 日交易宣布后告诉美国广播公司 CNBC。

据美国媒体报道，这一价格较 2025 年底与英伟达最初谈判时 70 亿美元的估值有了显著提高。