Nvidia has held talks in recent weeks to acquire Hugging Face in a deal that would value the open-source AI platform at more than 13 billion dollars, according to Business Insider. The companies have not reached an agreement yet and the talks could still fall apart, a person familiar with the matter said. Microsoft also met with Hugging Face, but those talks are no longer ongoing.
An acquisition would be the chip giant's boldest move yet to control the open-source AI ecosystem. Hugging Face hosts millions of models, datasets and tools that developers build on, making it the neutral hub of modern AI development. Nvidia already participated in Hugging Face's 235 million dollar funding round in 2023, which valued the company at 4.5 billion. Hugging Face previously turned down a 500 million dollar investment from Nvidia last year that would have valued it at 7 billion, saying it did not want a dominant investor swaying decisions.
Nvidia has been on a dealmaking spree, with 18 billion committed to equity investments for the rest of its fiscal year on top of the 47.9 billion it already holds in private companies. Owning Hugging Face would give Nvidia a bigger foothold with developers and could push more workloads onto its chips. But it also risks complicating the platform's neutrality, since Hugging Face supports models and hardware from across the industry. Founders and open-source developers will be watching closely to see whether the deal closes and what it means for the independence of the AI ecosystem.