The Reinvention of Computing: From Software 1.0 to Software 2.0 and Beyond
The End of the Free Ride of Moore's Law
For the past 60 years, general-purpose computing as we know it has existed. However, for the last 30 years, we've had the benefit of Moore's Law - an incredible phenomenon where, without changing the software, the hardware could continue to improve in an architecturally compatible way. This has allowed every single industry to be built on top of this foundation.
But now, we know that the scaling of CPUs has reached its limit. The free ride of Moore's Law has ended, and we can no longer afford to do nothing in software and expect that our computing experience will continue to improve, costs will decrease, and the benefits will continue to spread.
To address this challenge, the company was started to accelerate software. The vision was that there are applications that would benefit from acceleration, and this acceleration benefit has the same qualities as Moore's Law for applications that were impossible or impractical to perform using general-purpose computing.
One example is real-time computer graphics, which was made possible because of NVIDIA's introduction of GPUs. However, the company felt that long-term accelerated computing could be far more impactful. There is no single magical processor that can accelerate everything in the world, as that would just be called a CPU. Instead, the computing stack needs to be reinvented from the algorithms to the architecture underneath, and connected to applications on top.
This reinvention of the computing stack has led to the acceleration of various industries, from semiconductor manufacturing and computational lithography to simulation, computer-aided engineering, and quantum computing. In each of these domains, the company has been able to accelerate the applications by 20, 30, or even 50 times, but it has required a rewrite of the software, which is why it has taken so long in each of these domains.
One of the most famous application libraries created is called CDNN, which made it possible to democratize artificial intelligence as we know it. These acceleration libraries now cover so many different domains that it appears that accelerated computing is used everywhere.
The reinvention of the computing stack has also led to a fundamental shift in the way software is developed. The industry has moved from the traditional approach of coding algorithms (Software 1.0) to the use of machine learning, where the computer learns the patterns and relationships of massive amounts of observed data to essentially learn the function that predicts the output (Software 2.0).
This shift has led to the complete reinvention of the computing stack, from the hardware to the way software is developed and what software can do. The company has dedicated itself to advancing this field, and the result is the Blackwell system - a massive system designed to study data at an enormous scale, allowing the discovery of patterns and relationships and the learning of the meaning of various types of data.
The Future of Computing: Agentic AI and Physical AI
The company has now developed two important platforms to leverage this technology: NVIDIA AI Enterprise and NVIDIA Omniverse.
NVIDIA AI Enterprise focuses on the creation of "agents" - large language models that can understand data, reason about tasks, and connect with other AI models to perform various tasks, such as marketing, customer service, or chip design. These agents are onboarded and evaluated, with a suite of libraries and APIs to help companies operate them.
NVIDIA Omniverse, on the other hand, is a virtual world that obeys the laws of physics, where robots can learn to be robots. This, combined with the DGX computer for training the models and the AGX Jetson for running the AI models in the physical world, represents the company's vision for the future of "physical AI" - the ability to create and deploy AI models in the real world, from autonomous vehicles to robotic factories and warehouses.
The reinvention of computing, from Software 1.0 to Software 2.0 and beyond, is a testament to the company's dedication to advancing the field of computing and its applications. As the industry continues to evolve, the company is poised to play a crucial role in shaping the future of artificial intelligence and its integration into the physical world.
Part 1/6:
The Reinvention of Computing: From Software 1.0 to Software 2.0 and Beyond
The End of the Free Ride of Moore's Law
For the past 60 years, general-purpose computing as we know it has existed. However, for the last 30 years, we've had the benefit of Moore's Law - an incredible phenomenon where, without changing the software, the hardware could continue to improve in an architecturally compatible way. This has allowed every single industry to be built on top of this foundation.
But now, we know that the scaling of CPUs has reached its limit. The free ride of Moore's Law has ended, and we can no longer afford to do nothing in software and expect that our computing experience will continue to improve, costs will decrease, and the benefits will continue to spread.
The Rise of Accelerated Computing
[...]
Part 2/6:
To address this challenge, the company was started to accelerate software. The vision was that there are applications that would benefit from acceleration, and this acceleration benefit has the same qualities as Moore's Law for applications that were impossible or impractical to perform using general-purpose computing.
One example is real-time computer graphics, which was made possible because of NVIDIA's introduction of GPUs. However, the company felt that long-term accelerated computing could be far more impactful. There is no single magical processor that can accelerate everything in the world, as that would just be called a CPU. Instead, the computing stack needs to be reinvented from the algorithms to the architecture underneath, and connected to applications on top.
The Reinvention of the Computing Stack
[...]
Part 3/6:
This reinvention of the computing stack has led to the acceleration of various industries, from semiconductor manufacturing and computational lithography to simulation, computer-aided engineering, and quantum computing. In each of these domains, the company has been able to accelerate the applications by 20, 30, or even 50 times, but it has required a rewrite of the software, which is why it has taken so long in each of these domains.
One of the most famous application libraries created is called CDNN, which made it possible to democratize artificial intelligence as we know it. These acceleration libraries now cover so many different domains that it appears that accelerated computing is used everywhere.
The Shift from Software 1.0 to Software 2.0
[...]
Part 4/6:
The reinvention of the computing stack has also led to a fundamental shift in the way software is developed. The industry has moved from the traditional approach of coding algorithms (Software 1.0) to the use of machine learning, where the computer learns the patterns and relationships of massive amounts of observed data to essentially learn the function that predicts the output (Software 2.0).
This shift has led to the complete reinvention of the computing stack, from the hardware to the way software is developed and what software can do. The company has dedicated itself to advancing this field, and the result is the Blackwell system - a massive system designed to study data at an enormous scale, allowing the discovery of patterns and relationships and the learning of the meaning of various types of data.
The Future of Computing: Agentic AI and Physical AI
[...]
Part 5/6:
The company has now developed two important platforms to leverage this technology: NVIDIA AI Enterprise and NVIDIA Omniverse.
NVIDIA AI Enterprise focuses on the creation of "agents" - large language models that can understand data, reason about tasks, and connect with other AI models to perform various tasks, such as marketing, customer service, or chip design. These agents are onboarded and evaluated, with a suite of libraries and APIs to help companies operate them.
NVIDIA Omniverse, on the other hand, is a virtual world that obeys the laws of physics, where robots can learn to be robots. This, combined with the DGX computer for training the models and the AGX Jetson for running the AI models in the physical world, represents the company's vision for the future of "physical AI" - the ability to create and deploy AI models in the real world, from autonomous vehicles to robotic factories and warehouses.
[...]
Part 6/6:
The reinvention of computing, from Software 1.0 to Software 2.0 and beyond, is a testament to the company's dedication to advancing the field of computing and its applications. As the industry continues to evolve, the company is poised to play a crucial role in shaping the future of artificial intelligence and its integration into the physical world.