In the tech industry, there are companies that, even if they work together on certain projects, don’t get along too well. It’s the market itself that forces them to collaborate even if they’d rather not. Something like this happened for a long time between Apple and NVIDIA, whose relationship has always been a bit complicated. A new report from The Information has revealed more details and background on the situation.
The beginning of the relationship between Apple and NVIDIA was already rough
Apple and NVIDIA began collaborating seriously in the early 2000s. At that time, Apple wanted to boost the graphics capabilities of its Macs using NVIDIA chips. However, by that time, the relationship was already relatively tense. It all started because Steve Jobs, former CEO of the Cupertino giant, was convinced that NVIDIA used technology copied from Pixar.
Jobs raised the idea with an NVIDIA executive at a meeting in 2001. The executive denied it, and Apple’s CEO response was to ignore them for the rest of the meeting. Meanwhile, NVIDIA also considered Apple to be too demanding. Apple was not even among the company’s top 10 customers, but its conditions were reportedly excessive. The feeling was mutual, according to the source, as Apple saw NVIDIA as a difficult company to work with.
The incident with defective NVIDIA chips
2008 marks another turning point in the complicated relationship between the two companies. That year, a faulty NVIDIA chip that affected many devices forced Apple to extend warranties on its MacBooks. The problem did not only affect Apple; it also caused harm to buyers of Dell and HP laptops. Apple did not get full compensation for the incident, dubbed “Bumpgate.” This did prompt them to accelerate the shift to AMD, which would mark the prelude to the development of Apple’s own ARM chips.
Apple already had concerns regarding the energy efficiency of NVIDIA’s laptop chips. The company felt that they were too power-hungry and generated more heat than was desirable. With this in mind, Apple reportedly approached NVIDIA about developing custom chips for MacBooks. However, NVIDIA refused to collaborate with Apple on this venture. After all, it was in their best interest if Apple had to continue buying their licensed hardware.
2010-2020 decade: NVIDIA suspects Apple stole its technology; macOS loses NVIDIA driver support
In the 2010s, NVIDIA became suspicious of some brands making unauthorized use of licensed technologies or techniques in graphics hardware for smartphones. The brands in question were Samsung, Qualcomm, and Apple itself. So, NVIDIA sought to demand licensing fees from these companies as compensation.
Later, in 2019, a senior Apple executive decided that macOS Mojave would no longer support Nvidia drivers. This affected both the remaining support and the correct operation of eGPUs (external GPUs). Interestingly, it was never clear which Apple executive gave the order. Developers from both Apple and NVIDIA were willing to work together, but an order from a superior prevented it.
Currently, the relationship between Apple and NVIDIA “isn’t entirely acrimonious,” the report says. However, Apple is fully committed to developing its own AI chips rather than buying hardware from NVIDIA. If you’re not aware, NVIDIA is the world leader in the AI chip space, so most of the big tech names turn to them. Apple, perhaps out of “pride,” has not turned to NVIDIA to buy AI hardware directly, instead renting it through third parties like Amazon, Microsoft, and Google.
