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AI Hardware — The Sideline

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Section · 30 pieces in the archive

AI Hardware.

All ai hardware coverage from The Sideline.

30 articles

OpenAI's Jalapeño Chip Is a Direct Shot at Nvidia's Inference Dominance

OpenAI's Jalapeño Chip Is a Direct Shot at Nvidia's Inference Dominance

OpenAI has unveiled Jalapeño, its first custom inference chip built with Broadcom—a direct move to reduce its dependence on Nvidia and cut the ballooning cost of running AI models at scale.

Dispatch desk · Jun 25, 2026

Nvidia's Rubin Data Centers Run Scorching Hot—And That's Actually the Point

Nvidia's Rubin Data Centers Run Scorching Hot—And That's Actually the Point

Nvidia's Rubin-generation liquid-cooled data center design makes real strides on water consumption—but the full environmental math is a lot more complicated than the press release lets on.

Dispatch desk · Jun 23, 2026

Nvidia's "Water-Free" Data Center Cooling Is Only Half the Story

Nvidia's "Water-Free" Data Center Cooling Is Only Half the Story

Nvidia's new liquid cooling system genuinely eliminates on-site data center water use — but that only accounts for a quarter to a third of AI's total water footprint. The rest is hiding in the power grid.

Dispatch desk · Jun 23, 2026

Groq Raises $650M and Reinvents Itself After Nvidia's Talent Heist

Groq Raises $650M and Reinvents Itself After Nvidia's Talent Heist

After Nvidia's talent-and-IP raid left Groq without its founder or its core hardware advantage, the company just raised $650 million and is betting its future on inference cloud. Here's an honest look at whether that bet makes sense.

Dispatch desk · Jun 23, 2026

Amazon Wants to Sell Trainium Chips to the World — And It Might Actually Be Nvidia's Biggest Headache Yet

Amazon Wants to Sell Trainium Chips to the World — And It Might Actually Be Nvidia's Biggest Headache Yet

Amazon is in talks to sell its Trainium AI chips directly to third-party data centers—a move that could build a $50 billion chip business and put real pressure on Nvidia. The demand is there, but the path from shareholder letter to actual silicon sales is littered with supply chain landmines.

Dispatch desk · Jun 19, 2026

Edge AI Is the Next Semiconductor Goldmine — And No, It's Not Nvidia This Time

Edge AI Is the Next Semiconductor Goldmine — And No, It's Not Nvidia This Time

AI is migrating off massive server clusters and onto billions of edge devices — and that shift is creating a semiconductor opportunity that has nothing to do with Nvidia's GPU dominance.

Dispatch desk · Jun 16, 2026

Jensen Huang's $1 Trillion Chip Pick: Bold Vision or Master Distraction?

Jensen Huang's $1 Trillion Chip Pick: Bold Vision or Master Distraction?

Jensen Huang is calling his shot on the next trillion-dollar AI chip stock. We break down what the hype gets right, what it conveniently skips, and why "Jensen said so" is a vibe, not an investment thesis.

Dispatch desk · Jun 15, 2026

Nvidia's Long Game: N2X, N3X, and the Audacious Push to Build a Star Trek Computer

Nvidia's Long Game: N2X, N3X, and the Audacious Push to Build a Star Trek Computer

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang confirmed N2X and N3X chips are already in the pipeline beyond RTX Spark — here's what the Star Trek computer roadmap actually means for on-device AI, and what the keynote conveniently glossed over.

Dispatch desk · Jun 5, 2026

OpenAI Just Bet $40M on a Webcam Company Making a Mystery Audio Gadget

OpenAI Just Bet $40M on a Webcam Company Making a Mystery Audio Gadget

Opal Camera is rebranding to Opal Electronics, armed with a $40M OpenAI-led Series B and a mystery AI audio gadget being tested by Sam Altman and top AI lab executives. Here's what's actually going on.

Dispatch desk · Jun 3, 2026

Nvidia Wants a Piece of the $200B CPU Market — Meet the RTX Spark, Jensen Huang's Next Big Bet

Nvidia Wants a Piece of the $200B CPU Market — Meet the RTX Spark, Jensen Huang's Next Big Bet

Nvidia unveiled the RTX Spark at Computex, a 1-petaflop CPU designed to run local AI agents on Windows PCs from Microsoft, Dell, HP, and others — but the $200B CPU dream comes with some very familiar risks.

Dispatch desk · Jun 2, 2026

Cathie Wood Is Betting Big on an AI Chip IPO — Should You Care?

Cathie Wood Is Betting Big on an AI Chip IPO — Should You Care?

Cathie Wood is loading up on a hot AI semiconductor IPO — but between benchmark theater, lockup cliffs, and a valuation multiplier called "AI," there's a lot to unpack before you follow her lead.

Dispatch desk · Jun 2, 2026

The archive

30 pieces.

Every ai hardware piece The Sideline has ever published.

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