WHEN: Wednesday, May 20, 2026
WHERE: CNBC
Following are excerpts from the unofficial transcript of a CNBC interview with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and CNBC's Sara Eisen for a wide-ranging conversation yesterday following the release of Nvidia's Q1 results.
All references must be sourced to CNBC.
HUANG ON WHETHER CAPEX NUMBERS FROM THE HYPERSCALERS CAN CONTINUTE
VIDEO: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang: With Anthropic we are scaling very quickly, we have big plans for them
JENSEN HUANG: The hyperscalers is where the AI frontier models are, and we're gaining share there. We're gaining share there because we've already always supported OpenAI and xAI and Meta MSL and Microsoft's AI and a whole bunch of other AI startups, but this year we had the benefit of also winning Anthropic. We're helping them scale capacity, so that they could have more reach, generate more revenues, and grow their company. And so, with Anthropic, we're scaling very, very quickly. We've got big plans for them, and so we're gaining share in AI inference, we're gaining share in hyperscale. The second category is a category that you really have to have a complete solution, including CPUs and GPUs and networking and switches and data processing and security processing, and the whole software stack, which Nvidia is quite unique in having, and so the second category, whether it's industrial on-prem with manufacturing or enterprise on-premise, AI native clouds, the CoreWeaves, the Nebiuses, Nscales, so many others, and of course, the sovereign AI nations, where they want to have their own governance, and they want to build it themselves. All of these different data centers, in the second category, Nvidia is fairly unique in being able to serve, and that represents half of our business, and it's also the fastest growing.
HUANG ON COMPETITION FROM AMAZON AND OTHERS
VIDEO: We don't let noise around competition distract us, says Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang
HUANG: We have, we have a lot of competition, but as you know, we're very good at this, and so just because a competitor emerges, this, the distance, the path, the journey from announcing a chip to eventually building a sustainable business is a long journey, and so we continue to serve all of our hyperscale clouds, and they have projects internally, many of the projects are delayed, and many projects are canceled, and some of them are sustained, and so I think a lot of it is quite noisy. We don't let it distract us. We don't, we only focus on supporting our hyperscale partners, helping the AI model builders grow. And, as I mentioned, you know, while competition and the number of announcements is growing, our share, overall share is growing and growing quite fast and so we're doing very well.
HUANG ON FEASIBILITY OF DATA CENTERS IN SPACE
VIDEO: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang on building data centers in space
HUANG: Well, you know, Nvidia is already in space. Hopper is already in space. Vera Rubin is on its way to space, and so you know, I think the ability to deploy data centers in space is a known ability. The question is, how do we scale that up? And so there's a fair amount of engineering and a fair amount of science that we still have to do to scale it up. There are no, as far as I could see right now, there are no physical limits, there's no laws of physics limitation. There are a lot of technical challenges, some things are way easier, some things are way harder, of course, but one of the things that's really terrific is that the amount of energy that will have in space is, you know, basically practically infinite, and so, so I think that that's a very big plus, and a really, a really great motivator, and a reason to really endeavor to put data centers out in space, but we is it we have four or five partners working with us in putting satellites out in space.
HUANG ON EXPECTATION ABOUT WHEN THEY WILL BE ABLE TO SELL CHIPS IN CHINA
VIDEO: Nvidia CEO on China: I ask investors to expect nothing and let things work out in due time
HUANG: I don't have any expectation, which is the reason why we – we put all of our guidance, all of our numbers, all the expectations that I've set with all of our analysts and investors to invest nothing, to expect nothing. And so that's my expectation. The demand in China is quite large, just as the demand for AI is quite significant here, it's quite significant there. They have indigenous companies. Huawei is very, very strong. They had a record year. They'll likely, very likely, have an extraordinary year coming up. And their local ecosystem of chip companies are doing quite well, because we've evacuated that market. We've really largely conceded that market to them. And so, I think that there – the Chinese government, I think, has rightfully would like to protect their local companies, and on the other hand, they also would like the world to know that China is an open market. And so somewhere between the desire to protect the local companies, which is understandable, and the desire to open up China for the world to invest in and participate in – which is a very much larger goal in my opinion. The tension between those two desires ultimately will get worked out over time. In the meantime, we've, you know, we're very clear that we would be more than delighted to serve the market. We have a lot of customers there, we have a lot of partners there, and we've been there for 30 years, and we'd be more than joyed and honored to serve that marketplace. But at the moment, for all of our investors here and all the investors around the world, I would like to ask to expect nothing and let things work out in its own due time.
HUANG ON RECENT STOCK UNDERPERFORMANCE
VIDEO: Nvidia's Jensen Huang on stock performance: Concerns around company have been clearly addressed
HUANG: You know, that's one of the mysteries of the universe, but I think that all of this is going to get sorted out. In the end, they can't hold back performance. And at this point – and the people said, you know, what about competition? I think that that they ought to go back and reflect on all of the announcements that were made. How many of them have been canceled, how many of them have been delayed, how many of them, you know, just quietly diminished. And all of those announcements reflect on those – as all these press releases and announcements were being made, and where we are. I think that we've been very consistent. Every single year we're going to raise the bar. Every single year we're going to introduce new technology. And so our annual rhythm our incredible technology leapfrog every single year, every, you know, significant leap every single year. And so I think that the competition factor. Is AI useful factor. And I think that that's now been put to rest. It's very clear that the ROI of AI is incredibly good. The token margins are incredibly good. Compute equals revenues, so people need more compute, so that they can grow their revenues. There's the question about infrastructure spend, and on how much investment in capex of course –
EISEN: Whether it is too much.
HUANG: This year, the world – the world very clearly has gone to a trillion dollars on its way to $3 trillion towards the end of the decade. You know, I said that about a year ago, very few people understood it, believe it, but I think most people are starting to understand that in this new AI era, compute is revenues. And to the extent that the CSPs and and software companies and technology companies want revenues in their business, they're going to need compute to generate the revenues. And so I think each one of these concerns that were brought up this last year has been very, you know, fairly clearly addressed. And I think that in time, I think people will recognize our position in the marketplace, the value we deliver, and how we're supporting the ecosystem to create this new industry. Everything will get sorted out.