Nvidia will make a $1 billion equity investment in Nokia at a subscription price of $6.01 per share, the two companies announced.
With this investment, which is subject to certain customary closing conditions, Nokia will issue 166,389,351 new shares to Nvidia, giving it a 2.90% stake in the Finnish company.
Nokia said it will use the proceeds from the issuance to accelerate its strategic plans to “advance trusted connectivity for the AI supercycle and other general corporate purposes.”
Moreover, Nokia intends to accelerate development of its 5G and 6G RAN software to run on Nvidia’s architecture and will also make investments to increase its presence in the AI & Cloud market with data center-aligned networking solutions.
In addition to this equity investment, Nokia and Nvidia also agreed to collaborate on AI networking solutions and explore opportunities to incorporate Nokia’s data center switching and optical technologies in Nvidia’s future AI infrastructure architecture.
Circling back to RAN tech, Nvidia said that T-Mobile U.S. will collaborate with Nvidia and Nokia “to drive and test AI-RAN technologies as a part of the 6G innovation and development process, reinforcing its global leadership in driving wireless innovation.” Trials are expected to begin next year and will be focused on field validation of performance and efficiency gains for customers.
“The next leap in telecom isn’t just from 5G to 6G — it’s a fundamental redesign of the network to deliver AI-powered connectivity, capable of processing intelligence from the data center all the way to the edge. Our partnership with Nvidia, and their investment in Nokia, will accelerate AI-RAN innovation to put an AI data center into everyone’s pocket,” said Justin Hotard, President and CEO of Nokia.
“We’re proud to drive this industry transformation with Nvidia, Dell Technologies, and T-Mobile U.S., our first AI-RAN deployments in T-Mobile’s network will ensure America leads in the advanced connectivity that AI needs,” Hotard further added.
Commenting on the partnership with Nokia and T-Mobile, Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of Nvidia, said, “Telecommunications is a critical national infrastructure — the digital nervous system of our economy and security. Built on Nvidia CUDA and AI, AI-RAN will revolutionize telecommunications — a generational platform shift that empowers the United States to regain global leadership in this vital infrastructure technology. Together with Nokia and America’s telecom ecosystem, we’re igniting this revolution, equipping operators to build intelligent, adaptive networks that will define the next generation of global connectivity.“
Source 1, Source 2