NVIDIA's (NASDAQ: NVDA) graphics processing unit (GPU)-based approach to high-performance computing and deep learning, a category of artificial intelligence (AI) in which machines are trained to make inferences from data the way humans do, has begun making inroads into the global oil and gas industry. This is great news for investors, as this is a multitrillion-dollar industry that forms the foundation of the global economy. While renewable forms of energy have been steadily displacing fossil fuels to generate electricity and electric vehicles (EVs) have begun lessening the transportation industry's ravenous appetite for petroleum products, full transformations of these realms will take decades. Moreover, beyond being used to produce just about everything, oil derivatives are key ingredients in products ranging from plastics and fertilizers to the asphalt that paves our roads and the synthetic fibers that clothe many of us. In 2018, NVIDIA has announced two wins in the oil and gas space.

The company is an early mover in its industry in using high-performance computing, and in 2014 it won an award from the HPC community's leading publication, HPCwire, for the best use of the tech in the oil and gas industry. "NVIDIA's Tesla GPU-accelerated computing platforms have been instrumental in supporting Eni's exploration activity, improving our ability to turn around advanced seismic imaging tasks in a shorter time and with a higher accuracy," an NVIDIA blog quoted Luca Bertelli, Eni's chief exploration officer, as saying.