> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://venture-block.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # DOJ asks whether Nvidia's $12.9B Hugging Face deal gives it control of AI distribution - URL: https://venture-block.com/doj-nvidia-hugging-face-antitrust-inquiry/ - Published: 2026-10-29T14:09:39.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-29T14:09:39.000Z - Description: Justice Department officials are asking whether owning Hugging Face would give Nvidia leverage over AI rivals, as part of a wider look at its deals for Groq, SchedMD and Run:ai. - Author: Venture Block - Tags: Policy, AI The US Department of Justice has started asking how Nvidia's planned $12.93 billion purchase of Hugging Face would affect competition in artificial intelligence, [Reuters reported on Wednesday](https://www.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/exclusiveus-doj-is-inquiring-about-nvidias-purchase-of-hugging-face-sources-say-4980450?ref=venture-block.com), citing two people familiar with the matter. Officials have asked whether owning the widely used open-model platform would let the biggest supplier of AI chips capture a fundamental distribution point for AI, the people said. The questions sit inside a broader, years-long DOJ investigation into Nvidia's conduct, which covers its acquisitions, investments and sales practices, and whether it has pressured customers, the people told Reuters. [CNBC said it confirmed the inquiry](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/28/doj-questions-nvidias-12point9-billion-hugging-face-deal.html?ref=venture-block.com) with a separate person familiar with the matter. Nvidia declined to comment to both outlets, and Hugging Face did not respond to Reuters. An inquiry is not a finding of wrongdoing, and it may never lead to a lawsuit. ## What Nvidia agreed to buy Nvidia signed the definitive agreement on September 2 and announced it the next day. According to its [Form 8-K filing](https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1045810/000104581026000078/nvda-20260902.htm?ref=venture-block.com), the deal includes roughly $11.9 billion payable to Hugging Face stockholders, subject to adjustments, and an equity retention program of up to about $1.0 billion for employees who join Nvidia. Closing is expected in the first half of 2027 and depends on regulatory approvals. Hugging Face has become a central home for the open-model community. In his [announcement post](https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/nvidia-to-acquire-hugging-face/?ref=venture-block.com), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said more than 18 million developers, researchers and creators use the platform to share more than 3 million models, 500,000 datasets and 1 million applications, and that more than 200,000 companies use it to find, test and deploy AI. Nvidia itself is the largest contributor of open models and data to the hub, with more than 500 models and more than 250 datasets released there, Huang wrote. That reach is what makes the deal sensitive. A developer who downloads open weights from Hugging Face, whether a model from Nvidia or from a Chinese lab like the one behind [Kimi K3.1](https://venture-block.com/moonshot-kimi-k3-1-pro-open-weights/), usually also picks where to run it. A platform owner that also sells the dominant accelerator could, in theory, steer defaults, benchmarks or hosted inference toward its own hardware. Reuters said DOJ officials are asking how Nvidia might use the platform to harm rivals, whether it would gain leverage from it, and about Hugging Face's competitors. ## Nvidia's openness pledge Nvidia moved early to answer that concern. Huang wrote that Nvidia compute "will not be required to build on or deploy through Hugging Face" and that the platform would keep supporting multi-cloud and multi-accelerator work. The 8-K turns that into a stated commitment: Hugging Face would keep letting model makers and users upload and download the models and datasets they choose, and would keep supporting other silicon vendors. The filing also flags a political risk unrelated to antitrust. It notes that many of the most popular open-source models originated in China, and warns that any restriction on supporting models from a particular region could have a material impact on both Hugging Face and Nvidia. ## A pattern regulators are tracing The Hugging Face questions are not the only deal the DOJ has looked at. According to Reuters, investigators have examined Nvidia's December 2025 acquisition of SchedMD, the company behind open-source software used to run supercomputers, and its earlier purchase of Run:ai, which makes software that helps AI chips run more efficiently. They have also looked at Nvidia's 2025 deal to license technology from chip startup Groq and hire its engineers. Officials explored whether Nvidia offered customers larger allocations of AI chips if they also bought its networking gear and Groq processors, Reuters reported, a question about whether a dominant product was used to win a newer market. CNBC put the Groq transaction at $20 billion, which makes Hugging Face Nvidia's second-largest deal. The closest comparable to Hugging Face, CNBC noted, is GitHub, which Microsoft bought in 2018 for $7.5 billion. The deal lands as Nvidia's web of AI investments grows. Reuters noted the company backs leading labs such as OpenAI and Anthropic, whose [IPO filing](https://venture-block.com/anthropic-s1-ipo-nasdaq-ant-revenue/) Venture Block covered this week. ## Where the review goes next The broad Nvidia investigation began under President Joe Biden and has continued under President Donald Trump, Reuters said. A DOJ spokesperson declined to comment on specific matters but said: "It would be inappropriate for the Department to conduct a merger investigation under the guise of a conduct investigation." The department routinely asks companies for input when it evaluates proposed mergers, and staff-led investigations often take years. Tech antitrust cases can end with conduct commitments rather than a block, as when the European Commission [accepted Microsoft's offer to sell its office suites without Teams](https://venture-block.com/microsoft-reaches-major-antitrust-settlement-unbundles-teams-to-boost-choice-in-productivity-software/). For now, Nvidia and Hugging Face are still separate companies. Nvidia has said it [expects to close](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/03/nvidia-agrees-to-buy-hugging-face-for-almost-13-billion-ai-expansion.html?ref=venture-block.com) in the first half of 2027, after the required regulatory approvals.