Nvidia
The deal would give the world's dominant AI chipmaker control of one of the most widely used platforms for open-source artificial intelligence models.

Nvidia has agreed to buy Hugging Face for $12.9 billion, according to multiple reports. The deal would give the world's dominant AI chipmaker control of one of the most widely used platforms for open-source artificial intelligence models.

The agreement was first reported by The Information, citing a person familiar with the deal. CNBC separately cited a source who confirmed that an Nvidia acquisition had been part of ongoing and recent talks.

There is some uncertainty over whether a transaction has been finalized. Business Insider reported that the companies had discussed a deal worth more than $13 billion but said an agreement had not yet been signed and talks could still fall apart. Reuters also reported The Information's account of a $12.9 billion agreement on Thursday.

Hugging Face has become a central platform for developers to share, test and deploy AI models and datasets. Nvidia already has a relationship with the company, having participated alongside Salesforce, Google, Amazon and others in a $235 million funding round in 2023 that valued Hugging Face at $4.5 billion.

The two companies have also worked together commercially. In 2023, Nvidia announced a partnership that connected Hugging Face users with its DGX Cloud infrastructure, allowing developers to train and customize generative AI models using Nvidia computing.

Hugging Face previously resisted a larger Nvidia investment. The startup rejected a $500 million offer last year that would have valued it at $7 billion because it did not want one investor gaining too much influence over the business, the Financial Times reported. The platform had about 13 million users and hosted roughly 2.5 million public AI models at the time.

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A takeover would come as Nvidia uses its enormous cash generation to expand beyond the processors that power much of the AI industry. The company has increasingly invested in model developers, infrastructure providers and other companies across the sector.

Nvidia reported another surge in business Wednesday. Quarterly revenue more than doubled from a year earlier to $96.2 billion, while data-center revenue jumped 117% to $89 billion, according to the company's latest earnings release. CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia was benefiting from both frontier AI laboratories and a growing open-model ecosystem.

Hugging Face, meanwhile, has been generating roughly $150 million in annual revenue and is nearing profitability, TechCrunch reported. At $12.9 billion, Nvidia's reported purchase price would be almost three times the startup's valuation in its last major funding round.