Nvidia posts $2.23 billion revenue for Q2 with AI and cryptocurrency gaining momentum

Nvidia has posted a revenue increase of 56 per cent to $2.23 billion in their recent Q2 financials.

The increase is down to the adoption of Nvidia’s GPU technology across data centres and for its work in artificial intelligence. The company also noted how its technology is being used for mining in cryptocurrency.

During the quarter, Nvidia announced its collaborations with Activision and Bungie in bringing Destiny 2 to PC and has been working on both VR and graphics enhancement with Project Holodeck and external GPU support for its Titan X range of graphics cards. The company also provides a bespoke chip for the Nintendo Switch console that launched earlier this year.

However, its biggest gain has been in AI and data centre computing, despite this missing earnings estimates. The new DGX AI computers were announced (you can see how this is being used for animation technology with Remedy and USC here) and the GPU Cloud platform was launched with its AI software suite.

Another big gain was in the way gaming chips have been used to for cryptocurrency mining with the rise of competitors to Bitcoin like Ethereum. "Cryptocurrency and blockchain is here to stay, said Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang on the earnings call. "The market need for it is going to grow. And over time, it will become quite large.

"In Gaming, increasingly the world’s most popular form of entertainment, we power the fastest growing platforms – GeForce and Nintendo Switch. Nearly every industry and company is awakening to the power of AI. Our new Volta GPU, the most complex processor ever built, delivers a 100-fold speedup for deep learning beyond our best GPU of four years ago. This is the era of AI, and the NVIDIA GPU has become its brain. We have incredible opportunities ahead of us."