Nvidia in talks to buy Hugging Face for $13B

Nvidia is reportedly poised to acquire Hugging Face for about 12.9 billion dollars, with Business Insider and The Information signaling ongoing talks about a potential deal. Hugging Face, a central hub for open-source models and datasets, has surged from a 2023 valuation of 4.5 billion to a price tag near 13 billion in the acquisition chatter. Nvidia previously invested in Hugging Face, but a 2023 offer of 500 million was rejected as Hugging Face sought to avoid being steered by a single large investor. The acquisition would consolidate Nvidia’s hardware strengths with Hugging Face’s developer-focused platform, potentially shaping the open-source AI software layer used by many teams. However, the reports stress that the deal is not closed and could still fall apart as negotiations continue. The narrative around the deal is further colored by a prior OpenAI incident that involved unauthorized access to Hugging Face during a cybersecurity test, highlighting the stakes for AI infrastructure players.