Nvidia has agreed to buy artificial intelligence platform Hugging Face for $12.9 billion, marking a major move beyond computer chips as demand for AI technology continues to surge worldwide.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang announced the agreement on Thursday in a company blog post. He said Hugging Face would remain open to the entire AI industry after the acquisition. The deal is expected to strengthen Nvidia’s position in AI by expanding its reach into software, models and computing infrastructure. It could also give developers and organizations greater access to AI tools and resources.
Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue said the company approached Huang during the summer to discuss a possible deal. He said that the agreement came together within a few weeks. Huang also said the companies recognized that open-source AI had reached an important stage of development. He described Nvidia as a strong home for Hugging Face as the technology moves forward.
The acquisition would become Nvidia’s largest deal, though it is expected to be surpassed by the company’s roughly $20 billion purchase of Groq assets in December 2025. Before that transaction, Nvidia’s biggest acquisition was Israeli chipmaker Mellanox, which the company bought for nearly $7 billion in 2019.
Nvidia’s graphics processing units have played a major role in the rapid growth of generative AI. However, the planned acquisition shows that Nvidia’s ambitions extend beyond hardware. The company is increasingly focusing on the software, AI models and infrastructure needed to build and operate advanced AI systems.
The agreement also comes after Hugging Face recently experienced a cybersecurity incident. Delangue said the incident highlighted the importance of open AI models and collaboration. Huang argued that open systems can allow more people to work together to identify and defend against threats.
The deal also signals that the competition in AI is moving beyond powerful chips. Software, models, open-source technology and infrastructure are becoming increasingly important in the race to shape the future of artificial intelligence.
