How NVIDIA's Arm acquisition will drive AI to every edge

NVIDIA is sitting pretty in AI (artificial intelligence) right now. For the next few years, most AI systems will continue to be trained on NVIDIA GPUs and specialized hardware and cloud services that incorporate these processors. However, NVIDIA has been frustrated in its attempts to become a dominant provider of AI chips for deployment into smartphones, embedded systems, and other edge devices. To address that strategic gap, NVIDIA this past week announced that it is acquiring processor architecture firm Arm Holdings from SoftBank Group and the SoftBank Vision Fund. Once the acquisition closes in the expected 18 months, NVIDIA will retain Arm's name, brand identity, management team, and base of operations in Cambridge, United Kingdom.