WHY THIS MATTERS
Nvidia has struck a $6 billion licensing deal with startup Poolside to use its model building technology, called Model Factory, while also investing another $1 billion in the company at a $12 billion pre-money valuation, according to a Bloomberg report published on August 20, 2026 and confirmed by Benzinga, PYMNTS, Yahoo Finance and Forbes. More than 100 Poolside employees, including engineers, are expected to join Nvidia to work on its open weight Nemotron AI project, while Poolside continues operating independently under its three co-founders. The company says the goal is to advance artificial general intelligence as an open technology rather than one controlled by a few companies, a move aimed squarely at rivals including OpenAI, Anthropic, DeepSeek and Kimi.In this article
A $7 Billion Deal in Total
Bloomberg reported on August 20, 2026 that Nvidia struck a deal with startup Poolside worth a combined roughly $7 billion: $6 billion to license the company's model building technology, called Model Factory, plus another $1 billion in direct investment, valuing Poolside at $12 billion pre-money. The information was confirmed by Benzinga, PYMNTS, Yahoo Finance, KuCoin, Dealroom and Forbes, the latter reporting on August 24.
More Than 100 Employees Move to the Nemotron Project
As part of the deal, more than 100 Poolside employees, including engineers and other technical staff, are expected to join Nvidia to work on Nemotron, the chipmaker's open weight artificial intelligence project. The license specifically covers Model Factory, the system Poolside uses to build its Laguna family of open weight coding models. Despite the staff move, the deal is non exclusive, Poolside's three co-founders remain in their roles, and the company continues operating independently.
The Rationale Behind the Deal: Open AGI, Not Controlled by a Few
According to Poolside, the deal with Nvidia aims to advance artificial general intelligence as an open technology, rather than one controlled by a small number of companies. The stance aligns with Nvidia's broader push to promote open source artificial intelligence systems, a strategy that also helps guarantee long term demand for the company's own chips, regardless of which AI lab ends up leading the market.
Nvidia Takes Aim Directly at OpenAI, Anthropic, DeepSeek and Kimi
The move puts Nvidia in an unprecedented position: beyond supplying the chips that power nearly every major artificial intelligence lab, the company is now building its own model technology with the potential to compete directly with customers such as OpenAI, Anthropic, DeepSeek and Kimi. The bet on open rather than closed models also sets Nvidia's approach apart from these competitors.
Why It Matters for Brazilian Agencies and SMBs
Nvidia's entry into the race for open weight artificial intelligence models is likely to speed up the supply of free or low cost alternatives to the closed models that currently dominate customer service and marketing automation tools. For Brazilian agencies and SMBs already using or evaluating open source AI in their products, Nemotron is one more name to watch when comparing cost, licensing and performance before swapping a closed model for an open one in automated service projects, especially since a larger catalog of open models tends to push down the price charged by closed model providers in upcoming business cycles.