The CEO of Nvidia, Jensen Huang, said in an interview that Nvidia is currently the largest client of the Taiwanese chip manufacturer TSMC, pushing Apple from first place. Huang made this statement on the “A Bit Personal with Jodi Shelton” podcast, answering a question about the company’s confidence and long-term ambitions.
According to Huang, Nvidia was still one of TSMC’s biggest customers in the early 2000s, but in the 2010s, Apple took the lead thanks to huge orders for iPhone and iPad chips, especially after Intel missed the opportunity to cooperate with Apple. However, the explosion in demand for AI processors has once again changed the balance of power.
The AI boom is changing the balance in the chip industry
Huge demand for Nvidia AI graphics processors has led to a surge in revenue, as corporate clients are willing to pay billions of dollars for the hardware needed to train advanced artificial intelligence models. Unlike the consumer and private consumer markets, where there is a clear price limit, business users continue to buy as many GPUs as they can get their hands on.
At the same time, there have been rumors that TSMC is increasing the prices it charges Apple, allegedly because of the pressure the AI sector is putting on production capacity. According to that unofficial information, Apple may no longer be a priority in production, but such claims remain in the realm of speculation for now and have not been officially confirmed.
Nvidia riding a wave of current success is largely dependent on the duration of the AI boom. If interest in artificial intelligence subsides and data centers remain unused, it is expected that Apple could once again take over the position of TSMC’s largest client. Until then, the distribution of power in the semiconductor industry clearly shows how AI is currently the dominant factor, writes TomsHardware.