Jim Keller, an engineer who has worked at AMD<\/a>, Apple<\/a>, and Tesla<\/a> and is now CEO of an AI chip startup<\/a> taking on Nvidia<\/a>, says that Nvidia is “becoming the IBM of the AI era.”<\/p>\n On a Sunday podcast episode of DemystifySci<\/a>, Keller brought up Nvidia’s AI chips and called attention to companies like Microsoft<\/a> and Google<\/a> that are using Nvidia’s technology to power their own innovations.<\/p>\n “All the big tech companies are in an arms race and they’re all calling Nvidia,” Keller said.<\/p>\n Related: <\/b>Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Turned Down a Merger Offer in the Company’s Early Days, According to Insiders. Here’s Why.<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n Keller, who now leads the $2 billion<\/a> AI chip startup Tenstorrent<\/a>, which has funding<\/a> from Samsung<\/a> and Hyundai<\/a>, stated that Nvidia currently has “the best processors by functionality.”<\/p>\n He then said that Nvidia is “slowly becoming the IBM of the AI era,” adding, “We’ll see how that goes. I run an AI tech company so I have opinions about that too.”<\/p>\n Nvidia is now the industry leader for AI chips, with over 80%<\/a> of the market share. It benefits from a first-mover advantage<\/a> in AI computing; Nvidia claims to have started investing in AI and machine learning development starting in 2006<\/a>.<\/p>\n Related: <\/b>Employees Who Worked at This Company for the Past 5 Years Are Now Multi-Millionaires in ‘Semi-Retirement’<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n IBM, too, could be considered a first mover in the PC market. Though IBM did not invent the PC, the company’s 1981 personal desktop<\/a> opened computers up to a broader audience and generated $1 billion<\/a> in revenue in its first year.<\/p>\n IBM “set a technology standard” with its first PC, according to IEEE Spectrum<\/a>.<\/p>\n Keller has previously weighed in on the cost of AI chips, both from Nvidia and from ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, which currently uses Nvidia’s chips. He claimed in April<\/a> that Nvidia could have cut research and development costs and in February<\/a> that he could build AI processors for all workloads and AI companies at one-eighth of the cost suggested by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.<\/p>\n Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said in March that its next-generation AI chip would cost more than $30,000<\/a>.<\/p>\n Related: <\/b>Here’s How Much Investing $10,000 in Nvidia When It Went Public Would Be Worth Now<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/assets.entrepreneur.com\/images\/misc\/1720645065_Jim-Keller-GettyImages-1767732249.jpg?width=1000\")
Jim Keller, chief executive officer of Tenstorrent. Photographer: SeongJoon Cho\/Bloomberg via Getty Images<\/sup><\/i><\/p>\n