Loyalty in business is rare and usually expensive. Nvidia is apparently willing to pay for it: the chip giant is reportedly planning a $30 billion equity investment in OpenAI, despite the collapse of an earlier $100 billion deal, the public announcement of OpenAI’s chip diversification strategy, and ongoing questions about the company’s profitability. The investment reflects a decision to prioritize long-term relationship value over short-term supply chain logic.
OpenAI is raising approximately $100 billion in its next round at a $730 billion valuation. The figure is remarkable: nearly double Anthropic’s recent valuation, and just below SpaceX in the private company rankings. Amazon, SoftBank, and Microsoft are expected to join Nvidia as investors, creating a coalition of capital behind what is already the world’s most recognized AI brand.
The journey to this point has involved considerable drama. Nvidia’s $100 billion “investment” last September drove its market cap above $5 trillion but was built on chip purchase commitments that economists and governance experts quickly identified as circular. OpenAI, it later emerged, was already exploring alternative chip suppliers even as the deal was being celebrated — a fact that became public knowledge this month when the deal quietly dissolved.
That dissolution opened the door to a renegotiation. OpenAI formalized its chip partnerships with AMD and Broadcom. Nvidia, rather than walking away, chose to restructure its involvement as a pure equity investor. The new deal gives Nvidia a stake in OpenAI’s financial future without tying either company to specific hardware commitments — a cleaner arrangement for everyone involved.
Whether OpenAI can justify its enormous valuation remains the central question. Market share is falling. Anthropic is gaining. Cash burn is high. Advertising experiments are attracting backlash. Multiple investors are publicly uncertain about the scope of their commitments. But Nvidia has made its choice — and at $30 billion, it is one of the most consequential investment decisions in the history of the AI industry.