Can Nvidia repeat its record-breaking year?

Chipmaker Nvidia had a record-setting 12 months in 2025, changing into the world’s most respected firm because the frenzy round synthetic intelligence propelled its rise to the highest.

Now the Santa Clara large is positioning itself for one more 12 months on high.

“The race is on for AI,” Jensen Huang, Nvidia’s chief government and co-founder, stated on the CES commerce present in Las Vegas this week. “All people’s making an attempt to get to the following stage. All people’s making an attempt to get to the following frontier.”

The 62-year-old tech mogul, carrying a black crocodile leather-based jacket, outlined his bold imaginative and prescient for the longer term, one stuffed with self-driving automobiles, robots and different clever machines that transcend the digital display and work together with folks within the bodily world.

As a keystone within the AI growth, Nvidia has additionally been caught up in issues that trillions of {dollars} are being poured into AI corporations which are overhyped and overvalued, forming a bubble that can burst.

Nvidia has helped gas the fireplace, investing in corporations similar to ChatGPT maker OpenAI, Intel and CoreWeave. Nvidia has additionally backed Elon Musk’s xAI.

It has been an unprecedented ascent for a high-end chipmaker that wasn’t well-known exterior of some tech circles simply 5 years in the past.

The AI bubble is unlikely to burst any time quickly, analysts say, and even when it does, Nvidia gained’t be the toughest hit, as it’ll proceed to dominate the marketplace for high-end AI chips and develop new methods to convey AI into extra merchandise.

“Nvidia goes to just do nice,” stated Gil Luria, head of know-how analysis at D.A. Davidson. “And it’s actually a sign that we’re utilizing AI instruments quite a bit.”

Listed here are a number of the questions that can decide whether or not this large Californian firm stays on high.

How has Nvidia benefited from the AI growth?

Nvidia was co-founded by Huang in 1993 after he studied engineering in Stanford. It rose to prominence by specializing in specialised pc chips used not just for gaming but in addition for cryptocurrency mining, AI mannequin coaching and robotics.

It now employs greater than 36,000 folks throughout 38 international locations, together with at its sprawling facility in Silicon Valley. Nvidia primarily designs its chips in California and largely manufactures and assembles them in Asia. Final 12 months, the corporate stated it was working with its manufacturing companions to construct Nvidia Blackwell chips in Arizona and AI supercomputers in Texas.

In November, Nvidia reported a document $57 billion in income for the third quarter, up 62% from a 12 months in the past. The corporate additionally stated final 12 months it secured $500 billion in orders for its AI chips by means of 2026.

Late final 12 months, it grew to become the primary firm to climb above a market worth of $5 trillion, catapulting Huang’s internet value to greater than $160 billion.

Nvidia has additionally struck some main partnerships, together with with OpenAI, saying in September that it deliberate to speculate as much as $100 billion within the San Francisco startup. OpenAI intends to construct and deploy no less than 10 gigawatts of AI information facilities with Nvidia’s techniques.

Information facilities home computing tools used to course of the large troves of data wanted to coach and keep AI techniques.

What’s Nvidia doing to remain within the highlight?

Nvidia is making an attempt to make sure its chips are embedded with each new wave of AI-powered innovation. Its chips are arduous to amass, so the world’s largest manufacturers are lining as much as work intently with the corporate.

Huang detailed Nvidia’s work with Mercedes-Benz, which makes use of the tech firm’s autonomous automobile software program.

“We think about that sometime a billion automobiles on a street will all be autonomous,” he stated, including that individuals could also be hailing robotaxis and even personal a self-driving automotive.

The primary autonomous automotive powered by Nvidia’s know-how will hit the street in the US within the first quarter earlier than being launched in Europe and Asia, he stated.

He showcased Nvidia’s portfolio of AI instruments to assist self-driving automobiles purpose as they navigate site visitors.

In a video shot in San Francisco, a self-driving Mercedes-Benz powered by Nvidia yielded to pedestrians and automobiles on the street.

At one level, cute robots joined on stage as Huang mentioned how Nvidia’s know-how additionally helps advance the event of robots of all shapes and sizes that ship meals, elevate heavy objects or carry out surgical procedure.

A brand new highly effective AI chip, named after the American astronomer Vera Rubin, is in “full manufacturing,” he stated.

Huang additionally talked about how Nvidia’s merchandise are getting used to construct private assistants. He mentioned Nvidia’s expanded partnership with know-how firm Siemens to convey AI into industrial workflows, together with design and manufacturing.

Nvidia ramped up its partnerships with the leisure trade as properly. The corporate teamed up with Universal Music Group to “pioneer accountable AI for music discovery, creation and engagement.”

What does this imply for Nvidia’s future?

Nvidia’s newest strikes will assist the corporate develop because it tries to spur extra demand.

“The beginning of trillions of AI spending all started with the Godfather of AI Jensen and Nvidia as they’re the one recreation on the town with their chips, the brand new gold and oil,” wrote Wedbush Securities analysts in a word.

Robotics and autonomous know-how characterize “an incremental market alternative” for Nvidia, and the corporate may finally attain a $6 trillion market cap, the word stated.

As tech corporations attempt to unleash extra self-driving automobiles on the street, they may additionally face hurdles in convincing folks and regulators to change into extra comfy with autonomous automobiles, Luria stated.

“It seems virtually inevitable,” he stated. “The timeline is the larger query. Is it imminent? Is it inside the subsequent couple of years, or is it nonetheless 10 to twenty years away?”

What hurdles may Nvidia face?

Regardless of being a significant participant within the AI race, uncertainty lingers about Nvidia’s market in China, which could possibly be value $50 billion yearly. Tariffs and commerce restrictions additionally affect the chipmaking large.

The corporate lobbied aggressively for the U.S. authorities to ease export restrictions on AI chips so it may promote its H200 chips to Chinese language corporations.

President Trump and tech executives have expressed issues that China could lead on within the AI race and pose a menace to U.S. nationwide safety. However Huang has developed a detailed relationship with Trump and the H200 chip isn’t Nvidia’s most superior product.

In an uncommon deal, Trump stated Nvidia could be allowed to promote its H200 chips if the U.S. will get a 25% p.c minimize of the gross sales.

Huang stated at CES that buyer demand for these chips in China is “very excessive,” however there have been questions on whether or not gross sales will undergo.

The Information, citing nameless sources, reported that the Chinese language authorities requested some Chinese language tech corporations to halt H200 chip orders and will mandate home AI chip purchases.