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Zer0-Sum
02-04-2008, 11:14 PM
NVIDIA today confirmed rumblings that they were looking to buy physics-centric AGEIA Technologies. NVIDIA said today that an agreement to acquire the industry leaders in gaming physics, though the acquisition still remains subject to some closing conditions.

More details about the deal will shake out during NVIDIA's upcoming quarterly conference call, set for Feb. 13.

While AGEIA appears to continue to struggle breaking into the mainstream PC market, they've made significant in-roads into the console market with 140 PhysX-based games shipping or in development on the Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Wii and PC. The company has more than 10,000 registered and active users of their PhysX software development kit as well.

"NVIDIA is the perfect fit for us. They have the world's best parallel computing technology and are the thought leaders in GPUs and gaming. We are united by a common culture based on a passion for innovating and driving the consumer experience," said Manju Hegde, co-founder and CEO of AGEIA.

Full release on the jump. I wonder if NVIDIA would try to come up with a way to incorporate the PhysX engine into a graphics card, instead of requiring two pieces of hardware? Maybe that's not possible, actually.

SANTA CLARA, CA -- FEBRUARY 4, 2008--NVIDIA (Nasdaq: NVDA), the world leader in visual computing technologies and the inventor of the GPU, today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire AGEIA Technologies, Inc., the industry leader in gaming physics technology. AGEIA's PhysX software is widely adopted with more than 140 PhysX-based games shipping or in development on Sony Playstation3, Microsoft XBOX 360, Nintendo Wii and Gaming PCs. AGEIA physics software is pervasive with over 10,000 registered and active users of the PhysX SDK.

"The AGEIA team is world class, and is passionate about the same thing we are--creating the most amazing and captivating game experiences," stated Jen-Hsun Huang, president and CEO of NVIDIA. "By combining the teams that created the world's most pervasive GPU and physics engine brands, we can now bring GeForce®-accelerated PhysX to hundreds of millions of gamers around the world."

"NVIDIA is the perfect fit for us. They have the world's best parallel computing technology and are the thought leaders in GPUs and gaming. We are united by a common culture based on a passion for innovating and driving the consumer experience," said Manju Hegde, co-founder and CEO of AGEIA.

Like graphics, physics processing is made up of millions of parallel computations. The NVIDIA® GeForce® 8800GT GPU, with its 128 processors, can process parallel applications up to two orders of magnitude faster than a dual or quad-core CPU.

"The computer industry is moving towards a heterogeneous computing model, combining a flexible CPU and a massively parallel processor like the GPU to perform computationally intensive applications like real-time computer graphics," continued Mr. Huang. "NVIDIA's CUDA™ technology, which is rapidly becoming the most pervasive parallel programming environment in history, broadens the parallel processing world to hundreds of applications desperate for a giant step in computational performance. Applications such as physics, computer vision, and video/image processing are enabled through CUDA and heterogeneous computing."

AGEIA was founded in 2002 and has offices in Santa Clara, CA; St. Louis, MO; Zurich, Switzerland; and Beijing, China.

The acquisition remains subject to customary closing conditions.

More details about the acquisition will be provided during NVIDIA's quarterly conference call, to be held on Wednesday, February 13, 2008 at 2:00 PM, Pacific Time. The Company's prepared remarks will be followed by a question and answer period, which will be limited to questions from financial analysts and institutional investors. To listen to the conference call, please dial 212-231-2901; no password is required. The conference call will also be webcast live (listen-only mode) at the following Web sites: www.nvidia.com and www.streetevents.com.

Replay of the conference call will be available via telephone by calling 800-633-8284 (or 402-977-9140), passcode 21354792, until February 20, 2008. The webcast will be recorded and available for replay until the company's conference call to discuss its financial results for its first quarter, fiscal 2009.

http://kotaku.com/352495/nvidia-buying-ageia-for-bouncy-physx-tech

This is a super good move on NVidia's part. A next gen level GPU with a built in Physics processor. That is just off the hook. I have heard good thing about these Ageia PhysX cards, but only so many PC games make real use of them. I never bought one because of this very reason. I can't really see how any console games make use of the tech because none of the consoles have the PhysX cards built into them. THis will mainly be good for PC gaming as I see it. I look forward to seeing what NVidia does with this purchase.

curryking1
02-05-2008, 02:19 AM
I would like some GPU like that, please :)

Viper
02-05-2008, 04:14 AM
Long rumored and finally happening. Won't be long before AMD grabs Havok.

Zer0-Sum
02-05-2008, 04:23 AM
Long rumored and finally happening. Won't be long before AMD grabs Havok.

You are most likely right. I hope not, because Havok effects many more games that Ageia does. Besides, Havok is just software based and Ageia is hardware and software.

Garfunkel
02-05-2008, 06:59 AM
It's great. Now we should see the chips making an actual move in the industry now that it has larger support

It's bad for amd however. I am uncertain if they will just buy havock as a nervous reaction however it certainly is out there.

sprrol
02-05-2008, 07:53 AM
It certainly is bad for AMD. NVIDIA has Ageia, Intel has Havok, AMD has nobody.

Garfunkel
02-05-2008, 08:29 AM
yeah, but on the upside, their notebook GPU/platform is selling gangbusters.

But that's it :(

VG Aficionado
02-05-2008, 11:25 AM
And I just bought a 8800 GT :realmad:

Oh well, I couldn't wait.

woundingchaney
02-05-2008, 09:41 PM
Dont feel bad. The 8800gt is a very capable card.

I would imagine it is going to be a while before we start to see any hardware blending of Nv. and Ag. anyways. Though we might get lucky and see it in Late 08 or early 09.

This is a large acquisition for Nvidia (considerably more so on the software side than the hardware side of things).

VG Aficionado
02-05-2008, 11:45 PM
I had to buy it anyway, I couldn't even wait for any 9xxx GPU. I needed a new PC now and I could afford it. Besides, I guess Nvidia won't release these GPUs until next year.

Garfunkel
02-06-2008, 12:32 AM
I expect the blending will appear next year, no way will it be out this year, their organizations will still be merging and tripping over each other.

Still, now it makes the name geforce more suitable.

VG Aficionado
02-06-2008, 01:13 AM
^Indeed.

PhYmon
02-21-2008, 09:55 PM
LiNK (http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/15/geforce-8-gpus-to-acquire-physx-support-via-software-download/) So ppl who got a GeForce serie 8 will have physics support.. weee awesome.

Garfunkel
02-21-2008, 11:21 PM
sad i have a geforce 7 in my desktop and a geforce 9 in my laptop. Yes, i did say 9.