Did you know that US President Donald Trump wanted to ‘break up’ Nvidia, the global artificial intelligence leader and the world’s most valuable firm? Trump has said that his aim was to introduce more competition in the AI sector, but he was advised against touching Nvidia.According to a Bloomberg report, Trump revealed that he had contemplated dividing Nvidia Corp. to enhance competition in the AI chip sector, but later discovered the complexity of such an action.Recently, Nvidia hit a historic milestone this month by becoming the first company in the world to have over $4 trillion in market value – that’s more than the GDP of several major economies!Nvidia has benefited substantially from the increased demand for AI computing equipment required for large language models.
Why Did Trump Not ‘Break Up’ Nvidia?
“I said, ‘Look, we’ll break this guy up,’ before I learned the facts here,” Trump said on Wednesday at an AI conference in Washington. His advisers informed him about the significant challenges involved and explained that Nvidia’s market dominance would require years for competitors to match.“I figured we could go in and we could sort of break them up a little bit, get them a little competition, and I found out it’s not easy in that business,” Trump continued.Also Read | Forget Nvidia’s $4 trillion valuation! This tech company is set to cross $4.5 trillion market cap, thanks to its big AI betsDuring the event, Trump expressed admiration for Nvidia’s Chief Executive Officer Jensen Huang, who was present. Following Huang’s White House visit earlier this month, Nvidia received permission to resume H20 artificial intelligence chip sales to China, as part of a recent trade agreement with Beijing. Previously, the Trump administration had restricted these chip sales to China.“What a job you’ve done,” Trump said. During his speech, the president acknowledged and praised Huang, alongside other technology sector executives, for investing in the United States.Earlier that day, Huang’s presentation included praise for the president’s AI strategy. “America’s unique advantage that no other country can possibly have is President Trump,” Huang said.The Justice Department in 2024 launched an investigation to examine potential anticompetitive practices by Nvidia.At Wednesday’s gathering, Trump introduced his AI Action Plan, which, combined with several executive orders, aims to support the industry through reduced regulatory requirements.
