NVIDIA inks $5B deal with Intel to build new x86 SoCs with NVIDIA RTX GPUs for consumers

NVIDIA and Intel have just announced a new $5 billion deal that will see the two companies working together on joint chip development, where Intel will build custom x86 chips for NVIDIA with RTX GPUs onboard.

In the future we'll see new Intel processors with NVIDIA RTX GPUs as well as building NVIDIA's x86 CPUs for integration inside of AI clusters, with NVIDIA investing $5 billion in Intel's common stock at $23.28 per share. It's an interesting and rather game-changing move, as it means that Intel has all but walked away from its in-house GPU development, after rumors from many years ago that Intel could be canceling its Arc desktop GPUs altogether.

Fast forward to today and the world's biggest chipmaker has teamed with the world's biggest GPU company to use its RTX GPUs on new consumer x86 processors, what an interesting turn of events. Furthermore, we had rumors just a few months ago that said Intel would be making a custom NVIDIA chip on its Intel 18A node for the next-gen Nintendo Switch 3 console, and now this deal is here.

On the personal computing side of this deal, Intel will build and offer to the market new x86 SoCs that integrated NVIDIA RTX GPU chiplets, with the new x86 RTX SoCs to power a wide range of PCs that have world-class CPUs and GPUs inside.

What we don't know just yet: Intel will be fabbing the CPU chiplets at its in-house Intel Foundry, but it wasn't made clear if the NVIDIA RTX GPU chiplets will be fabbed by Intel, which would be fantastic to see. Right now, TSMC fabs all of NVIDIA GPUs for consumer and AI products, but if Intel Foundry can scoop up a huge bit of that business it would be a game-changer for Intel and its semiconductor business.

Intel stock is up over 22% from this news, showing how big it is to the market before we've even seen a product hit the market. Making a deal with the world's largest company is a big deal in itself, so it'll be great to see if this helps in the recovery of Intel which has been suffering in more than one way, for quite some time now.

What about NVIDIA x MediaTek's upcoming Arm-based SoC: NVIDIA has been working with MediaTek on a new Arm-based AI PC processor that has an NVIDIA RTX GPU, which has been delayed into 2026 reveal. This new Intel + NVIDIA deal doesn't have an effect on the MediaTek + NVIDIA deal, as NVIDIA will have both Arm and Intel options in the years ahead.

NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang said: "AI is powering a new industrial revolution and reinventing every layer of the computing stack - from silicon to systems to software. At the heart of this reinvention is NVIDIA's CUDA architecture. This historic collaboration tightly couples NVIDIA's AI and accelerated computing stack with Intel's CPUs and the vast x86 ecosystem - a fusion of two world-class platforms. Together, we will expand our ecosystems and lay the foundation for the next era of computing".

Lip-Bu Tan, CEO of Intel added: "Intel's x86 architecture has been foundational to modern computing for decades - and we are innovating across our portfolio to enable the workloads of the future. Intel's leading data center and client computing platforms, combined with our process technology, manufacturing and advanced packaging capabilities, will complement NVIDIA's AI and accelerated computing leadership to enable new breakthroughs for the industry. We appreciate the confidence Jensen and the NVIDIA team have placed in us with their investment and look forward to the work ahead as we innovate for customers and grow our business".