Who designs their chips
Nvidia's biggest customers all build their own AI chip now. Every one of them hired an outside firm to design it.
Which one surprised you?
Google's TPU: Broadcom, on a deal running to 2031. Meta's MTIA: Broadcom does the design, packaging and networking. Microsoft's Maia: co-designed with Marvell. Amazon's Trainium 3: reportedly Alchip, in Taiwan.
Nvidia's hyperscale revenue was $48.7B last quarter, double the $24.2B a year earlier.
Caveat: none of them uses a single partner. Google also works with MediaTek, and signed with Marvell in August.
Why it matters: owning the chip doesn't mean owning the know-how. The dependency moved, it didn't go away.
Want to see how this looks now?
Where the numbers come from
- Nvidia 10-Q, quarter to 26 Jul 2026, revenue by market platform (SEC filing)sec.gov
- Broadcom to develop Google TPUs until 2031 (DatacenterDynamics)datacenterdynamics.com
- Meta partners with Broadcom to co-develop custom AI silicon (Meta)about.fb.com
- Marvell's custom AI chips for Microsoft and AWS (Benzinga)benzinga.com
