Lex Fridman PodcastJensen Huang on Lex Fridman: Why CUDA almost sank NVIDIA
By absorbing fifty percent cost increases on GeForce to seed CUDA install base; agentic scaling now runs on foundations that nearly broke the company.
Episode Details
EPISODE INFO
- Released
- March 23, 2026
- Duration
- 2h 25m
- Channel
- Lex Fridman Podcast
- Watch on YouTube
- ▶ Open ↗
EPISODE DESCRIPTION
Jensen Huang is the co-founder and CEO of NVIDIA, the world's most valuable company and the engine powering the AI computing revolution. Thank you for listening ❤ Check out our sponsors: https://lexfridman.com/sponsors/ep494-sb See below for timestamps, transcript, and to give feedback, submit questions, contact Lex, etc. *Transcript:* https://lexfridman.com/jensen-huang-transcript *CONTACT LEX:* *Feedback* - give feedback to Lex: https://lexfridman.com/survey *AMA* - submit questions, videos or call-in: https://lexfridman.com/ama *Hiring* - join our team: https://lexfridman.com/hiring *Other* - other ways to get in touch: https://lexfridman.com/contact *EPISODE LINKS:* NVIDIA: https://nvidia.com NVIDIA on X: https://x.com/nvidia NVIDIA AI on X: https://x.com/NVIDIAAI NVIDIA on YouTube: https://youtube.com/@NVIDIA NVIDIA on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nvidia/ NVIDIA on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/nvidia/ NVIDIA on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NVIDIA/ NVIDIA on GitHub: https://github.com/NVIDIA Nemotron: https://developer.nvidia.com/nemotron *SPONSORS:* To support this podcast, check out our sponsors & get discounts: *Perplexity:* AI-powered answer engine. Go to https://lexfridman.com/s/perplexity-ep494-sb *Shopify:* Sell stuff online. Go to https://lexfridman.com/s/shopify-ep494-sb *LMNT:* Zero-sugar electrolyte drink mix. Go to https://lexfridman.com/s/lmnt-ep494-sb *Fin:* AI agent for customer service. Go to https://lexfridman.com/s/fin-ep494-sb *Quo:* Phone system (calls, texts, contacts) for businesses. Go to https://lexfridman.com/s/quo-ep494-sb *OUTLINE:* 0:00 - Introduction 0:33 - Extreme co-design and rack-scale engineering 3:18 - How Jensen runs NVIDIA 22:40 - AI scaling laws 37:40 - Biggest blockers to AI scaling laws 39:23 - Supply chain 41:18 - Memory 47:24 - Power 52:43 - Elon and Colossus 56:11 - Jensen's approach to engineering and leadership 1:01:37 - China 1:09:50 - TSMC and Taiwan 1:15:04 - NVIDIA's moat 1:20:41 - AI data centers in space 1:24:30 - Will NVIDIA be worth $10 trillion? 1:34:39 - Leadership under pressure 1:48:25 - Video games 1:55:16 - AGI timeline 1:57:29 - Future of programming 2:11:01 - Consciousness 2:17:22 - Mortality *PODCAST LINKS:*
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SPEAKERS
Lex Fridman
hostPodcast host and AI researcher known for long-form interviews on science and technology.
Jensen Huang
guestCo-founder and CEO of NVIDIA, leading the company’s GPU and AI computing platform strategy.
EPISODE SUMMARY
In this episode of Lex Fridman Podcast, featuring Lex Fridman and Jensen Huang, Jensen Huang on Lex Fridman: Why CUDA almost sank NVIDIA explores jensen Huang on co-design, scaling laws, power, and leadership philosophy Huang argues that AI performance now depends on distributing work across massive systems, making extreme co-design across chips, networking, power, cooling, software, and algorithms a necessity rather than an optimization.
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