Dept of Justice studying Nvidia’s $12.9B acquisition of Hugging Face – Reuters

The US Dept. of Justice is investigating Nvidia’s NVDA $12.9 billion planned acquisition of Hugging Face.

The antitrust regulator is looking at how a purchase of Hugging Face would affect competition in artificial intelligence, according to a  Reuters report on Wednesday, which cited people familiar with the matter. The probe covers Nvidia’s NVDA acquisitions, investments, sales practices, and whether the chip designer has exerted pressure on its customers.

On the Hugging Face purchase, the DOJ is looking at if the deal would let Nvidia NVDA capture a fundamental distribution point for AI, according to the Reuters report.

A DOJ spokesperson declined to comment to Reuters on any matters before the department, citing longstanding policy. Nvidia declined to comment, and Hugging Face representatives did not respond to a request for comment.