French Authorities Raided NVIDIA's France Office

[Torgoe]

Summary

The articles seem to suggest NVIDIA may have engaged in anti competitive practices in the cloud services market: "The chipmaker is reportedly suspected of committing anticompetitive practices in the graphics cards sector."  Their office in France was raided as part of an investigation.  According to the WSJ, their sources have stated it was NVIDIA that was raided but the French are not confirming one way or another.  

 

Quotes

Referring to NVIDIA "The chipmaker is reportedly suspected of committing anticompetitive practices in the graphics cards sector."

"Competition authorities will have to monitor that established players do not hinder the development of smaller or new players based on these technologies." 

 

My Thoughts

NVIDIA made $13.5billion in revenue and AI chips are selling "hotcakes" according to the article.  I get the impression this put them on France's radar.

 

Sources

 https://www.tomshardware.com/news/french-authorities-raided-nvidias-france-office

https://www.autoritedelaconcurrence.fr/en/press-release/cloud-computing-autorite-de-la-concurrence-issues-its-market-study-competition-cloud

https://www.networkworld.com/article/3707869/nvidias-french-offices-raided-for-anticompetitive-practices-report.html#:~:text=France's competition watchdog has raided,a focus on cloud computing.

[dizmo]

They're successful and thus it's anti competitive? What kind of BS is that?

The article really doesn't give much info at all.

[Taf the Ghost]

8 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Their successful and thus it's anti competitive? What kind of BS is that?

The article really doesn't give much info at all.

Well, it's Nvidia. They'll do everything they can generally get away with. That said, who knows with something like this. It could be local or national politics. Some issue with a local Union. I don't know all of the chipmakers in the new AI space, so it could be anticompetitive measures by the French authorities for a French company. 

 

I was going to make a joke about Intel still hasn't paid their fine for bribing System Integrators during the late 2000s, but I really don't want to actual go searching to find out it's stuck in another appeal.

[Lord Szechenyi]

31 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Their successful and thus it's anti competitive? What kind of BS is that?

Well tell that to the US Government when they sued Microsoft for bundling Internet Explorer into Windows...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.

[dizmo]

4 minutes ago, Lord Szechenyi said:

Well tell that to the US Government when they sued Microsoft for bundling Internet Explorer into Windows...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.

Not really the same thing. That had a reason. Granted, they could have a reason for this, but until that's provided, it's pretty sus.

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, Torgoe said:

The raid seems to be a part of a greater investigation into competition in cloud services market.

In what way???? I know they are the defacto only hardware option but what aspect is the problem? Nvidia's own cloud services? Nvidia's market power with other Cloud providers and their services??

[Torgoe]

2 hours ago, leadeater said:

In what way???? I know they are the defacto only hardware option but what aspect is the problem? Nvidia's own cloud services? Nvidia's market power with other Cloud providers and their services??

The French market study indicates "Competition authorities will have to monitor that established players do not hinder the development of smaller or new players based on these technologies."  That quote is taken from the second source in my originating post.  Whatever was discovered or suspected, it lead to an early morning raid.  The French appear to be looking into anti competitive practices.  (https://www.networkworld.com/article/3707869/nvidias-french-offices-raided-for-anticompetitive-practices-report.html#:~:text=France's competition watchdog has raided,a focus on cloud computing.)

 

According to the WSJ, their sources have stated it was NVIDIA that was raided but the French are not confirming one way or another.  https://www.autoritedelaconcurrence.fr/en/press-release/general-rapporteur-autorite-de-la-concurrence-indicates-unannounced-inspection-was

 

[leadeater]

9 hours ago, Torgoe said:

The French market study indicates "Competition authorities will have to monitor that established players do not hinder the development of smaller or new players based on these technologies."  That quote is taken from the second source in my originating post. 

Yep but that is all in regards to AWS, Google and Azure. I've actually read all the reports. But this does not answer in any way anything about Nvidia. GPUs aren't even large portions of any of these 3 hyperscaler Cloud providers either mind you. So while Nvidia is the only source for established HPC/ML/AI hardware that also isn't directly their fault either.

 

Basically it's rather interesting as to exactly why Nvidia is being looked at, evidence chain of the Cloud investigation or an actual potential suspect. I know Nvidia can basically ask whatever they want for their high end datacenter GPUs so it could be that or the authorities are just looking for evidence and not at all for the purpose of laying any charges against Nvidia.

 

[StDragon]

7 hours ago, leadeater said:

So while Nvidia is the only source for established HPC/ML/AI hardware that also isn't directly their fault either.

They're probably butthurt that Nvidia made a money printing machine and want in on the action. That or certain palms were greased to launch an investigation.

[wanderingfool2]

7 hours ago, leadeater said:

But this does not answer in any way anything about Nvidia. GPUs aren't even large portions of any of these 3 hyperscaler Cloud providers either mind you. So while Nvidia is the only source for established HPC/ML/AI hardware that also isn't directly their fault either.

They might be looking for evidence in regards to things like AI hardware though.  With the amount of cards being bought up it doesn't exactly make a trivial amount, and whether Nvidia is leveraging their power to slow/hamper other makers from making their own alternatives.

 

Like the concept that Nvidia has allegedly tried stopping AIB from making Intel's products.  Some places, not sure there, but they also have laws that prevent price gouging...so if they know they are the only providers and artificially increase the price to some unreasonable level then they could get in trouble that way.  There's also the concept that they might not lets say be evenly distributing the cards as well, at which point it becomes an issue if lets say they only are distributing it to some vendors and not others (where the others are ones where they view as a competitor)

 

My guess though is the former bit, where they are looking into Nvidia using power to try slowing/delaying the production of other companies chips.  (Or intentionally hiring away employees from competitors that they know are working on the competitors chips).