OpenAI and Broadcom plan their own AI chips

OpenAI is taking flight. Now that the AI company is beginning to break away from Microsoft, its ties to Nvidia are apparently also becoming more tenuous. To achieve this, OpenAI is reportedly planning to develop its own AI chips. There is support from Broadcom. A company that specializes in the production of customer-specific chips.

Initially the Financial Times reported on the collaboration. It said that Broadcom CEO Hock Tan had told investors about a new customer and an order worth more than 10 billion US dollars. Neither Tan nor Broadcom have officially confirmed that this is OpenAI. However, people familiar with the matter are said to have confirmed it. OpenAI also declined to comment. Broadcom's shares rose significantly following the talks.

OpenAI has been talking about entering the chip business for a long time. The main aim is to cover its demand for computing power –, which is ultimately growing and growing. So far, OpenAI has been dependent on Nvidia's chip production. It is initially unclear whether the chips developed will ever reach the open market or whether they will exclusively be used for their own purposes.

Big tech relies on its chips and infrastructure

Other big tech companies such as Meta, Google and Amazon are also working on their own chips. These custom-made AI chips are initially called XPUs, in contrast to the classic GPUs. Broadcom has already developed its TPUs together with Google – Tensor Processing Unit.

At the beginning of the year, when presenting its quarterly figures for the fourth quarter of 2024, Broadcom had already mentioned that major customers were interested in working together. The rumors from back then that OpenAI was one of these companies are now intensifying.

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman had already advertised his intention to build his own chip factories in 2023. He wanted to raise seven trillion US dollars (no, not billions) from investors. Altman was in talks with TSMC, Samsung and SK Hynix. Apparently nothing has come of this so far. Some of his proposals were ridiculed in the industry. OpenAI's partnership with G42 from Abu Dhabi has also not gone down well everywhere. G42 is to build a large AI data center, but is also closely linked to the Chinese government.

(emw)