Nvidia in early talks to deepen Reflection AI ties, reports say
Nvidia is in early talks to put more money into the AI startup Reflection AI, or possibly buy it, the Financial Times reported Saturday, and Bloomberg confirmed the talks. No deal has been agreed. Nvidia has already invested $800 million in Reflection, which makes open-weight AI models that anyone can use and change.
Nvidia is in early talks to deepen its ties with Reflection AI, the Financial Times reported Saturday. A deal could mean a bigger investment, more computing power or even buying the startup. Bloomberg confirmed the talks through its own source, but no terms have been agreed, and for now these are only talks.
The FT said a deal could take several forms. One is an "acqui-hire," in which Nvidia would hire Reflection's staff and license its technology instead of buying the company outright. That could let it skip a long review by regulators, the paper said, according to Reuters. The FT said a deal could come in the coming weeks but that the talks could still fall apart. Reuters said it could not confirm the report.
Bloomberg's source described the options as a larger stake or a deal to give Reflection more computing power. Nvidia did not respond to Bloomberg's request for comment, and Reflection declined to comment.
Nvidia, the world's most valuable company, has already put $800 million into Reflection, the FT reported. The startup was founded in 2024 by former Google DeepMind researchers Misha Laskin and Ioannis Antonoglou. It makes "open-weight" models, which means it releases the inner settings of its AI so others can use and change it for free. On Oct. 5 it launched its first such model, Beam, aimed at coding and AI agent tasks. Reflection says Beam costs less than many rivals and is meant to compete with cheaper Chinese models.
Reflection has held talks to raise $2.5 billion at a $25 billion value, Bloomberg reported, citing The Wall Street Journal. It has also signed billion-dollar deals with SpaceX and the cloud company Nebius for computing power.
The talks fit a string of big Nvidia deals. In September, it agreed to buy AI model company Hugging Face for $13 billion, and it struck a licensing deal worth about $20 billion with chip startup Groq, Bloomberg reported. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is a strong backer of open-weight models, and President Trump's 2025 AI action plan says America needs "leading open models founded on American values."
What we know: Nvidia and Reflection AI are in early talks about a closer tie-up, and Nvidia has already invested $800 million.
What we don't: Whether a deal will happen, what form it would take, and what it would be worth.
Where outlets agree The Financial Times and Bloomberg both report that Nvidia is in early talks to deepen its ties with Reflection AI, with no deal agreed yet.
Where they differ The outlets cited here report the same key facts so far.