CONFIRMED

Nvidia invested $3.5 billion in convertible bonds issued by MediaTek, the Taiwanese chipmaker, in a deal revealed in late August 2026. The agreement, centered on custom AI chips for data centers, PCs and cars, was confirmed by CNBC, TechCrunch, Forbes and Tom's Hardware. MediaTek shares jumped about 10% after the announcement.

What MediaTek gets: access to NVLink Fusion

At the center of the deal is MediaTek's adoption of Nvidia's NVLink Fusion platform, an interconnect technology that lets hyperscalers and other tech companies design custom AI chips capable of plugging directly into Nvidia based data center infrastructure. In practice, MediaTek can now offer its customers a path to design custom silicon without giving up compatibility with Nvidia's GPU and networking ecosystem.

Why Nvidia is funding the companies building alternatives to it

The move comes exactly as a growing number of AI giants and cloud providers, including Amazon, Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic, invest in building their own chips to reduce reliance on Nvidia GPUs. Rather than fight that trend, Nvidia chose to charge a toll on it: by funding MediaTek and pushing NVLink Fusion as the connection standard, the company cedes ground to custom silicon while making sure much of that silicon still has to run through its interconnect technology to work at scale.

The size of the market at stake

Nvidia's bet on MediaTek is not isolated. In June 2026, MediaTek itself said its custom AI chip business was expected to bring in $2 billion in revenue this year, with a total addressable market estimated at up to $80 billion by 2027. Nvidia's $3.5 billion investment shows the company does not want to sit out that slice of the market, even if it means helping strengthen a supplier that also serves rivals like Qualcomm.

Why it matters for Brazilian agencies and SMBs

Deals like this rarely affect a Brazilian agency's day to day directly, but they shape the cost of the infrastructure underpinning generative AI and automation tools used by SMBs months or years later. The more custom silicon vendors manage to connect to the Nvidia ecosystem without fighting it, the greater the chance more hardware options will compete on price downstream, which tends to benefit anyone paying for inference at scale on AI service and marketing platforms.

Sources

CNBC, Qualcomm rival MediaTek jumps 10% after $3.5 billion Nvidia AI chip deal: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/01/nvidia-deal-mediatek-shares.html | TechCrunch, Nvidia's $3.5B MediaTek bet reveals its plan for tackling Big Tech's AI chip buildout: https://techcrunch.com/2026/08/31/nvidias-3-5b-mediatek-bet-reveals-its-plan-for-tackling-big-techs-ai-chip-buildout/ | Forbes, Nvidia's $3.5 Billion MediaTek Deal Is A Tollbooth For Custom AI Chips: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jonmarkman/2026/08/31/nvidias-35-billion-mediatek-deal-is-a-tollbooth-for-custom-ai-chips/