Nvidia adds Hyundai, BYD and other automakers to its AV business

Nvidia It expands its autonomous vehicle development business deals to include Hyundai Motor, Nissan Motor And Isuzu, as well as Chinese automakers BYD and Geely, the software and chip giant, on Monday.

The new links are for Nvidia’s “Drive Hyperion” platform for autonomous vehicles. The system helps companies develop and deploy driver assistance and autonomous driving capabilities for “Level 4” autonomous vehicles, capable of driving without human intervention in pre-defined areas or conditions.

“We’ve been working on self-driving cars for a long time. The ChatGPT moment for self-driving cars has arrived,” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said Monday during the company’s GTC conference. “We now know we can successfully drive cars autonomously, and today, we’re announcing four new partners for Nvidia’s robo-taxi-ready platform. … The number of robo-taxi-ready cars in the future will be amazing.”

There are no vehicles for sale to consumers today that are capable of driving themselves without human supervision or intervention, but some companies, e.g alphabet Waymo offers taxi fleets with Level 4 autonomous vehicles, also known as robo-taxis. Most vehicles for sale today are considered Level 2, where drivers need to constantly monitor the systems.

Drive Hyperion is part of what Nvidia calls an “end-to-end” AV platform that includes data center training, large-scale simulations, and in-vehicle computing. The Company does not produce or sell self-driving vehicles or many of the components needed to operate these vehicles.

Nvidia’s current customers for Drive Hyperion include several self-driving companies like Aurora and Nuro, as well as other more consumer-facing companies like Sony group, Uber technologiesJeb’s father Stellantis And electric car maker Lucid Collection.

Self-driving vehicles are important for Nvidia, as self-driving cars remain one of the key areas where the chipmaker can show growth outside of artificial intelligence.

Many believe artificial intelligence could be key to the spread of autonomous vehicles, which Wall Street analysts and auto executives have targeted as a multi-trillion-dollar growth industry.

The new companies add to a growing list of such tie-ups with Nvidia, as the chipmaker and the auto and technology industries try to capitalize on and deploy autonomous vehicles after years of failed taxi projects.

Waymo has led the AV industry for years, while others are like it TeslaAnd Uber and Amazon Zoox is trying to catch up.

GMThe Cruise-backed company, once seen as a pioneer alongside Waymo, has been disbanded amid controversy after a pedestrian was dragged by one of its vehicles in San Francisco. GM spent more than $10 billion on Cruise before ending its robotics operations in 2024.

– CNBC Katie Tarasoff She contributed to this report.