NVIDIA
Pioneer of GPUs for gaming, AI, and supercomputing.
Nvidia Corporation (pronounced en-VID-ee-ə) is an American multinational technology company based in Santa Clara, California. It designs graphics processing units (GPUs), systems on chips (SoCs), and application programming interfaces (APIs) for fields like data science, high-performance computing, artificial intelligence (AI), as well as mobile and automotive uses. Founded in 1993 by Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky, and Curtis Priem, Nvidia is often considered a Big Tech company. Initially focused on GPUs for video games, Nvidia later expanded into AI, professional visualization, and supercomputing. In 2025, it became the first company to exceed US$4 trillion and US$5 trillion in market value, fueled by the AI boom and strong demand for its AI data center hardware.
**History**
**Founding**
Nvidia was established on April 5, 1993, by Jensen Huang, a Taiwanese-American electrical engineer who had been director of CoreWare at LSI Logic and a microprocessor designer at AMD; Chris Malachowsky, an engineer from Sun Microsystems; and Curtis Priem, a former senior staff engineer and graphics chip designer at IBM and Sun Microsystems. In late 1992, the three sketched out their initial ideas at a Denny's diner on Berryessa Road in East San Jose. Malachowsky and Priem were frustrated with Sun's management and wanted to leave, while Huang was on more stable ground running his own division at LSI. The trio discussed a vision for gaming and multimedia markets that convinced Huang to leave LSI and become CEO of their startup. They saw 3D graphics processing as the best way to tackle problems that general-purpose computing couldn't solve. Huang later noted that video games were both computationally challenging and had high sales volume, making them a "killer app" that could fund massive R&D. The first hurdle was deciding who would quit first. Huang's wife, Lori, wanted Malachowsky to resign from Sun before Huang left LSI, and Malachowsky's wife, Melody, felt the same about Huang. Priem broke the deadlock by resigning from Sun first, effective December 31, 1992. This pressured Huang and Malachowsky to follow suit; Huang left LSI on February 17 (his 30th birthday), and Malachowsky left Sun in early March. The three began working together in Priem's townhouse in Fremont, California, with $40,000 in the bank (about $89,000 in 2025).
Quick Facts
- Traded As
- NVDA · Nasdaq-100 component · DJIA component · S&P 100 component · S&P 500 component
- Industry
- Semiconductors · Artificial intelligence · Computer hardware
- Products
- GPUs (GeForce RTX / Quadro) · CPUs (Grace) · DPUs (BlueField) · SoCs (Tegra DRIVE) · DGX systems · CUDA
- Services
- GeForce Now · Omniverse · DGX Cloud · NVIDIA AI Enterprise
- Founded
- 1993-04-05, in Sunnyvale, California, US
- Founders
- Jensen Huang · Chris Malachowsky · Curtis Priem
- Hq Location City
- Santa Clara, California
- Hq Location Country
- US
- Area Served
- Worldwide
- Key People
- Jensen Huang (president and CEO) · Bill Dally (chief scientist) · Colette Kress (CFO)
- Revenue
- 215.9 billion (FY26)
- Operating Income
- 130.4 billion (FY26)
Facts from the source article.
Lore & Background
Nvidia was founded on April 5, 1993, by Jensen Huang, Chris Malachowsky, and Curtis Priem. The three co-founders discussed their initial ideas in a meeting at a Denny's roadside diner on Berryessa Road in East San Jose in late 1992. Malachowsky and Priem were frustrated with Sun's management and looking to leave, while Huang was running his own division at LSI. The co-founders envisioned 3D graphics-based processing as the best trajectory for tackling challenges that had eluded general-purpose computing methods, with video games as the 'killer app' to fund large R&D. The company was initially unnamed; after considering various combinations of the founders' names, the name 'Nvidia' was derived from the Latin word 'invidia' meaning 'envy'. The original headquarters office was in Sunnyvale, California.
During the late 1990s, Nvidia was one of 70 startup companies pursuing graphics acceleration for video games; only Nvidia and ATI Technologies (later merged into AMD) survived. In the early-to-mid 2000s, the company invested over a billion dollars to develop CUDA, a software platform and API that enabled GPUs to run massively parallel programs. As of 2025, Nvidia controlled more than 80% of the market for GPUs used in training and deploying AI models, and provided chips for over 75% of the world's TOP500 supercomputers. The company has also expanded into gaming hardware and services, including the Shield Portable, Shield Tablet, Shield TV, and the GeForce Now cloud gaming service, as well as the Tegra line of mobile processors.
Reader's Guide
Nvidia's significance stems from its transformation from a gaming GPU company into a dominant force in artificial intelligence and high-performance computing. The company's early bet on 3D graphics for video games provided the flywheel for massive R&D investment, leading to the development of CUDA, which unlocked GPU parallel processing for a broad range of compute-intensive applications. This positioned Nvidia to capitalize on the AI boom, and by 2025 it controlled over 80% of the market for GPUs used in training and deploying AI models. Its chips power more than 75% of the world's TOP500 supercomputers. Nvidia's market capitalization milestones—first surpassing US$4 trillion and then US$5 trillion in 2025—reflect the soaring demand for its AI data center hardware. The company's legacy includes pioneering consumer-level 3D hardware with the GeForce 256, which introduced onboard transformation and lighting, and surviving the competitive graphics market of the 1990s alongside only one other major player. Its acquisitions, including 3dfx, Ageia (PhysX), and Mellanox Technologies, have expanded its technological reach across physics simulation, high-performance computing, and networking.
Did You Know?
- Nvidia was founded after a meeting at a Denny's roadside diner in East San Jose in late 1992.
- The company's name comes from the Latin word 'invidia', meaning 'envy'.
- Nvidia became the first company to surpass US$4 trillion and US$5 trillion in market capitalization in 2025.
- In the early-to-mid 2000s, Nvidia invested over a billion dollars to develop the CUDA platform.
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