Nvidia, the maker of graphics processing units (GPUs) for gaming computers, is very interested in AI companies.  So much so, that back in April, they set up the Inception VC Alliance to help these companies connect with VCs, but there’s more going on here.

Jeff Herbst, a bizdev VP for the Inception program, explained back in April:  “We give them technology, we introduce them to our 150 different software development kits, we give them joint marketing, we introduce them to investors.  We give them Cloud Credits. We give them discounts for GPUs.” 

Wow, what gives with all the generosity?  Not going out on a limb here, but AI companies need major computational power, something that Nvidia GPUs were made to handle.  Their chips can obviously be used for more than gaming.  But it’s a win-win because in addition to the benefits mentioned, the companies get access to all of the data from the ecosystem which gives them unique insight into the AI economy.

A good picture of the AI landscape.  Nvidia has more than 8,500 AI startups in the Inception program which have raised a collective $60 billion in funding and hail from 90 different countries.  There are an estimated 12,000 AI startups in the world, so Nvidia has got a good handle on the majority of them.

Some interesting data points:

• 27% of the startups are from the U.S, followed by 12% from China, 7% from India and 6% from the UK.
   
• The top industries focused on by the startups are: health care, information technology services, intelligent video analytics, media and entertainment and robotics.
   
• Virtual and augmented reality startup companies are far outpacing any other segment within media and entertainment, including startups are coming to the program with a shared vision of building an ecosystem for the metaverse.

Serge Lemonde, global head of the Nvidia Inception program commented: “Now it’s about biology, pharma, DNA, and more…We saw during COVID new verticals grow fast, like virtual reality and augmented reality. We saw the usage of AI go up, [and] this metaverse shared vision in many countries go up.”

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