The Autorité de la concurrence, the French Competition Authority, has carried out a surprise raid on Nvidia’s French offices. The chipmaker is reportedly suspected of committing anticompetitive practices in the graphics cards sector.
The French Competition Authority didn’t disclose the name of the company on which it conducted the raid. It only mentioned a company “in the graphics cards sector.” The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that sources familiar with the matter claimed that it was Nvidia. Having obtained authorization from a judge, the French antitrust agency went forward with the raid.
“Such dawn raids do not pre-suppose the existence of a breach of the law which could be imputed to the company involved in the alleged practices, which only a full investigation into the merits of the case could establish, if appropriate,” wrote the French Competition Authority in the report.
According to WSJ, dawn raids consist of the authorities showing up early in the morning to confiscate a company’s physical and digital materials. They also interview the personnel that come into the office. The French Competition Authority stated that the raid was part of a more extensive operation launched in June to investigate the competition conditions in the cloud computing market.
Nvidia has significantly profited from the AI boom, made possible by the emergence of ChatGPT. As a result, Nvidia’s high-end AI chips, such as the H100 (Hopper), are selling like hotcakes. Nvidia’s latest financial results show that the company pulled in $13.5 billion in revenue, a whopping 101% improvement from last year. It isn’t a coincidence that Nvidia has become the world’s largest fabless chip designer.
WSJ reported that Nvidia declined to comment.
