At the APEC Summit, Nvidia and Samsung Electronics announced a sweeping new phase in their 25-year partnership.
Cue a drum roll, as they have unveiled plans for a massive AI factory that merges AI and semiconductor manufacturing. The collaboration is the convergence of advanced computing, robotics, and chip production — signaling the arrival of what Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang described as “the dawn of the AI industrial revolution.”
The new AI factory will integrate Samsung’s semiconductor technologies with Nvidia’s accelerated computing platforms, creating an intelligent production ecosystem capable of real-time decision-making and autonomous operations.
Equipped with more than 50,000 Nvidia GPUs, the facility will form the core of Samsung’s digital transformation, embedding AI into the heart of semiconductor manufacturing.
Pals exude positivity
Samsung and Nvidia’s relationship dates back to 1995, when Samsung supplied DRAM for Nvidia’s first graphics card, the NV1. Over the decades, the companies have collaborated on successive generations of memory technology, from early GDDR designs to today’s HBM3E and HBM4 standards. This deep technological interdependence has helped drive the evolution of graphics, gaming, and data-center computing — sectors now serving as the foundation for the AI era.
Industry analysts say this enduring partnership underscores how the semiconductor ecosystem is shifting from traditional chip manufacturing to full-scale computational infrastructure — an arena where AI, data, and hardware development intersect.
The AI factory
If you’re still here after those previous love-laden paragraphs, the forthcoming AI factory will integrate AI into every phase of semiconductor production. Using Nvidia’s accelerated computing and Omniverse digital twin technologies, Samsung will be able to model, simulate, and optimize its fabrication plants before physical deployment.
These digital twins create virtual replicas of global fabs that operate as live, synchronized environments — allowing engineers to test design changes, predict equipment failures, and plan maintenance without halting production. The approach aims to shorten the design-to-operation cycle and enhance yield, efficiency, and reliability across Samsung’s vast manufacturing network.
According to Nvidia, the integration of its Omniverse platform will also support AI-driven predictive maintenance and operational optimization, marking a shift toward self-correcting and autonomous factories.
Computational lithography
A cornerstone of the partnership is the acceleration of computational lithography — one of the most resource-intensive steps in chipmaking. Samsung’s OPC lithography platform is being enhanced with Nvidia’s CUDA GPU acceleration and cuLitho library, resulting in a reported 20-fold improvement in performance.
This breakthrough enables faster simulation and verification cycles, reducing both cost and time in developing next-generation chips. Samsung is also collaborating with key electronic design automation (EDA) companies — including Synopsys, Cadence, and Siemens — to reshape the tools that underpin chip design in the AI era.
Such progress is critical as the semiconductor industry confronts escalating complexity in transistor scaling and design verification. GPU-accelerated EDA workflows are increasingly viewed as the future of design automation, supporting not just faster chips but also more sustainable and efficient manufacturing practices.
Expanding AI across robotics and edge computing
Beyond manufacturing, Samsung is weaving Nvidia technologies into its robotics and smart device ecosystems. The company is deploying Nvidia RTX PRO servers and Jetson Thor edge AI platforms to power intelligent robots and automation systems. These are supported by the Nvidia Isaac Sim reference platform, built on Omniverse, which allows Samsung to test and train robots in simulated environments before deploying them in real-world operations.
By using digital twins and synthetic data generated through simulation, Samsung aims to bridge the gap between virtual development and physical implementation — a strategy expected to redefine industrial robotics and humanoid applications.
Building a fully autonomous fab
To support logistics and operations, Samsung is introducing real-time digital twins of its fabs powered by Nvidia RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition GPUs. These environments will allow for dynamic operational planning, anomaly detection, and logistics optimization, advancing the vision of a fully autonomous fab.
Industry observers suggest this could become a global template for AI-driven industrial management, combining hardware innovation with software intelligence at unprecedented scale.
Forward the foundation
The implications stretch beyond semiconductors. By embedding AI deeply into manufacturing processes, Samsung and Nvidia are redefining the boundaries of industrial computing — creating a model that could be adopted across automotive, energy, and robotics industries.
Their collaboration marks not only a technological milestone but also a strategic realignment of how global industry will be designed, built, and managed in the age of AI.
Things are going well for Nvidia. It also has just become the first company in history to surpass a $5 trillion market capitalization.