Nvidia has found a new way to handle its chip rivals: work with them. The GPU giant is combining its hardware with inference chips from the startup d-Matrix, The Information reported. The two will ship a joint system to run AI models. The AI-cloud firm Parasail will be its first customer, with the system due online later this year. It fits a wider Nvidia habit of partnering with the very companies trying to unseat it.
The logic follows the shape of AI work. Answering a prompt splits into two phases. A heavy “prefill” step suits Nvidia’s GPUs. A lighter, repetitive “decode” step runs more cheaply on specialised chips. Pairing the two lets each do what it does best.
What d-Matrix brings
d-Matrix built its Corsair accelerator around “in-memory computing”, which keeps data next to the logic that crunches it. Founded in 2019, it raised $275m at a $2bn valuation in November, and is raising again. CEO Sid Sheth says its edge is to put compute and memory on one chip. It also skips the pricey, scarce high-bandwidth memory that Nvidia’s chips lean on. The startup claims that pairing Corsair with GPUs runs tokens about 10 times faster, at roughly a third of the cost and up to five times less energy on some jobs.
