OpenAI unveiled its first custom AI chip, the Jalapeño, claiming industry-leading speed and efficiency for inference workloads. Analysts at Yole Group and TrendForce say the chip poses a threat to Nvidia’s dominance in inference, a fast-growing market segment. Research firm SemiAnalysis reported that Jalapeño outperformed Nvidia’s Blackwell on performance per watt in most tested scenarios, though it noted the comparison used newer HBM4 memory. Google, AWS, Meta and several startups are also developing custom AI chips, with Omdia expecting custom ASICs to exceed GPUs in volume by 2028. OpenAI had been one of the largest buyers of Nvidia GPUs, and its custom chip could reshape that commercial relationship.
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