- Deadly Israeli strike on Beirut likely targeted Hezbollah security chief
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- Clashes on South China Sea, Ukraine dominate Asia summit
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- Zelensky meets Pope, Scholz as whirlwind Europe tour ends
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- UK economy rebounds in August in boost to new govt
- Voice of Japan's beloved robot cat 'Doraemon' dies
- Shanghai markets sink ahead of briefing on mixed day for Asia
- Investors, analysts eye bigger China stimulus at Saturday briefing
- 20 Pakistan coal miners shot dead in attack: police
- Blinken condemns China's 'increasingly dangerous' sea moves
- Toyota returns to Formula One as Haas partner
- EU chief says China must 'adapt its behaviour' to solve trade row
- Musk unveils robotaxi, pledges it 'before 2027'
- Lynx rally, stun Liberty in overtime in WNBA Finals opener
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- 'Soul of old Baghdad': city centre sees timid revival
- Kittle at the double as Niners hold off Seahawks
- At least 11 dead in Florida but Hurricane Milton not as bad as feared
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- Asian markets mixed after Wall St drop, Shanghai dips before briefing
- Automaker Stellantis says CEO will retire in 2026
- Musk's promised robotaxi unveil delayed
- Kamada says Japan can close in on World Cup place against Australia
- On US coast, wind power foes embrace 'Save the Whales' argument
- Renewables revolt in Sardinia, Italy's coal-fired island
- Argentina held, Brazil leave it late in 2026 World Cup qualifiers
- Obama blasts 'crazy' Trump in first rally for Harris
- 2024 Nobel Peace Prize, a plea in favour of world order?
- Fry homers as Guardians down Tigers to stay alive in MLB playoffs
- Japan PM presses China's Li on airspace intrusion
- In Trump 'Truths,' conspiracies, attacks -- and doubts about the election
- How Sebastian Stan found a 'relatable' Trump for 'The Apprentice' biopic
- Panama's water wheel trash collector keeps plastic at bay
- It's still 'the economy, stupid,' says US political guru Carville
- Five key dates in the history of the America's Cup
- Zelensky to meet Pope, Scholz as whirlwind Europe tour ends
- At least 10 dead in Florida but Hurricane Milton not as bad as feared
- Far from eye, Hurricane Milton's deadly tornados rampaged Florida
- At least 10 dead in Florida after Hurricane Milton spawns tornadoes
- Argentina held, Bolivia stun Colombia in 2026 qualifiers
- Socceroos have 'nothing to fear' from Japan
- Sean 'Diddy' Combs sex trafficking trial set for May 2025
- Bolivia stun Colombia in World Cup qualifiers
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- Greece earn late win against England in Nations League, Italy-Belgium stalemate
- Trump biopic 'The Apprentice' hits US theaters weeks before election
AI giant Nvidia unveils higher performing 'superchips'
Nvidia on Monday unveiled its latest family of chips for powering artificial intelligence, as it seeks to consolidate its position as the major supplier to the AI frenzy.
"We need bigger GPUs. So ladies and gentlemen, I would like to introduce you to a very, very big GPU," said CEO Jensen Huang at a developers conference in California, referring to the graphics processors that are vital in the creation of generative AI.
The event, dubbed the "AI Woodstock" by Wedbush analyst Dan Ives, has become a can't-miss date on big tech's calendar due to Nvidia's singular role in the AI revolution that has taken the world by storm since the introduction of ChatGPT in late 2022.
"I hope you realize this is not a concert, this is a developers conference," Huang joked as he took the stage in a packed arena usually reserved for ice hockey games and concerts.
Nvidia's powerful GPU chips and software are an integral ingredient in the creation of generative AI, with rivals like AMD or Intel still struggling to match the power and efficiency of the company's blockbuster H100 product, launched in 2022.
Apple, Microsoft and Amazon have also developed chips with AI in mind, but for now are stuck trying to get their hands on Nvidia’s coveted products in order to deliver on their own AI promises.
That lynchpin role in the AI revolution has seen Nvidia's share price rise roughly 250 percent over the last 12 months, propelling the company above Amazon when measured by market capitalization, behind only Microsoft and Apple.
- 'Insane' -
Not letting up, Nvidia told the audience of developers and tech executives it was releasing an even more powerful processor and accompanying software, on a platform called Blackwell -- named after David Blackwell, the first Black academic inducted into the National Academy of Science.
Blackwell GPUs were AI "superchips" four times as fast as the previous generation when training AI models, Nvidia said.
"The rate at which computing is advancing is insane," Huang said.
They would also deliver 25 times the energy efficiency, Nvidia said, a key claim when the creation of AI is criticized for its ravenous needs for energy and natural resources when compared to more conventional computing.
Unlike its rivals Intel, Micron and Texas Instruments, Nvidia, like AMD, does not manufacture its own chips, but uses subcontractors, mainly the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.
Given the geopolitical concerns with Taiwan and China, this could be a potential weak spot, and the US has banned Nvidia from sending its most powerful chips to Chinese companies.
- Gr00T -
Nvidia also announced other AI developments, including a platform for training humanoid robots.
Project Gr00t, which Nvidia said was not named after the "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie character Groot, was described as the "world's first human foundation model."
Gr00t-powered robots will be designed to understand what people say and mimic people's movements, learning from experience how to interact with the world, according to Nvidia.
The models "will enable a robot to learn from a handful of human demonstrations so it can help with everyday tasks and emulate human movement just by observing us," Nvidia said.
Nvidia said it was also working with Apple to put AI capabilities into the newly released Vision Pro spatial computing gear.
The collaboration comes as Apple is under pressure to show it is not being left behind by Amazon, Google, Meta and OpenAI when it comes to artificial intelligence.
Nvidia also unveiled the Earth-2 Cloud Platform for predicting climate change, using simulation by AI supercomputers.
L.Durand--AMWN