Nvidia to invest $5 billion in struggling rival Intel
[September 19, 2025] By
KELVIN CHAN and MATT O'BRIEN
Nvidia, the world's leading chipmaker, announced on Thursday that it's
investing $5 billion in Intel and will collaborate with the struggling
semiconductor company.
Nvidia said it will spend $5 billion to buy Intel common stock at $23.28
a share. The investment, which is subject to regulatory approvals, comes
a month after the U.S. government took a 10% stake in Intel.
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang called it “a fusion of two world-class
platforms” that combines Intel's strength in making conventional
computer chips, known as CPUs, that power most laptops, with Nvidia's
focus on the specialized graphics chips that are critical for artificial
intelligence.
“This partnership is a recognition that computing has fundamentally
changed,” Huang told reporters Thursday. “The era of accelerated and AI
computing has arrived.”
Intel shares jumped nearly 23%, its biggest one-day percentage gain
since 1987. Nvidia shares added more than 3%.
For data centers, Intel will make custom chips that Nvidia will use in
its AI infrastructure platforms. For personal computer products, Intel
will build chips that integrate Nvidia technology.
The agreement provides a lifeline for Intel, which was a Silicon Valley
pioneer that enjoyed decades of growth as its processors powered the
personal computer boom, but fell into a slump after missing the shift to
the mobile computing era unleashed by the iPhone’s 2007 debut.
Intel fell even farther behind in recent years amid the AI boom that's
propelled Nvidia into the world's most valuable company. Intel lost
nearly $19 billion last year and another $3.7 billion in the first six
months of this year, and expects to slash its workforce by a quarter by
the end of 2025.
U.S. President Donald Trump's administration stepped in last month to
secure a 10% stake — 433.3 million shares of non-voting stock priced at
$20.47 apiece — making it one of Intel’s biggest shareholders. Federal
officials said they invested in Intel in order to bolster U.S.
technology and domestic manufacturing.
Of Nvidia’s own Intel stake, Huang said “the Trump administration had no
involvement in this partnership at all,” though “would have been very
supportive, of course.”
Intel's stock price surge Thursday pushed the total value of the U.S.
government’s stake in Intel to $13.2 billion, a $2.5 billion increase
from before Nvidia's announcement.
Huang said Nvidia has been in talks with Intel for about a year. Intel
CEO Lip-Bu Tan, who joined the press call with Huang on Thursday, said
he's been talking to Nvidia since he was named Intel's new leader in
March.
“This is a very big, important milestone,” Tan said. “I call it a
game-changing opportunity that we can work together.”
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Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang attends a media Q&A session during a visit
to London on Sept 17 2025. (AP Photo/Kelvin Chan)
 The deal is “bullish for U.S. tech,”
Wedbush Securities analyst Daniel Ives said in a client note.
Ives said it brings Intel “front and center into the AI game” and,
combined with the U.S. government stake, adds to "a golden few weeks
for Intel after years of pain and frustration for investors.”
Nvidia, meanwhile, has soared because its
specialized chips are underpinning the AI boom. The chips, known as
graphics processing units, or GPUs, are highly effective at
developing powerful AI systems.
Left out of the celebration Thursday was another U.S. chipmaking
rival, Advanced Micro Devices. Shares in the leading maker of both
GPUs and CPUs dropped slightly Thursday. AMD, Intel and Nvidia are
all headquartered in Santa Clara, California.
The deal between Nvidia and Intel comes as China moves to be less
dependent on U.S. semiconductor technology. This week, Chinese
officials reportedly forbade several large domestic technology
companies from purchasing Nvidia chips, and China-based Huawei
announced that it was expanding its development of AI chips and
manufacturing.
While Nvidia and Intel will work together to develop new chips, a
manufacturing deal has yet to be struck between the two. The
potential access to Intel's chip foundries by Nvidia poses a risk to
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, which currently
manufactures the tech giant's flagship processors. Huang emphasized
Thursday that both his company and Intel remain “very successful
customers” of TSMC.
Huang has been in Britain on a visit that coincides with Trump’s
trip to the country, and he has been attending events with the
president along with other Silicon Valley bigwigs.
At a signing ceremony for a trans-Atlantic tech partnership on
Thursday with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Trump mused that
AI was “taking over the world.”
“I’m looking at you guys. You’re taking over the world, Jensen,”
Trump said.
Huang and Trump also both attended a royal banquet, prompting the
tech mogul to dish about the Windsor Castle event to Intel's CEO in
the seconds before their press event.
“The cognac was excellent, but just not enough of it,” Huang told
Tan. “I guess the cognac was from 1912.”
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