Nvidia’s Huang says any Pentagon–Anthropic rift is ‘not the end of the world’

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said Wednesday that the dispute between the U.S. Defense Department and Anthropic is “not the end of the world.” 

His comments come after U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave Anthropic until Friday to loosen its rules on how the Pentagon can use its AI tools, or risk losing its government contract.

If Anthropic fails to comply, Hegseth threatened to label the company a “supply chain risk” or invoke the Defense Production Act, sources told CNBC’s Ashley Capoot and Kate Rooney earlier this week.

Speaking to CNBC’s Becky Quick on Wednesday, Huang said that the Defense Department has the right to use the technology and use the products that they procure in a way that serves their interests. 

Likewise, Anthropic has the right to decide how they would like to market their products and what kind of use cases they could be used for. “So I think they both have their reasonable perspective,” he said. 

Anthropic’s negotiations with the Department of Defense have stalled because it is seeking assurance that its models will not be used for autonomous weapons or mass surveillance of Americans. The Department of Defense, meanwhile, wants the company to agree to “all lawful use cases” without limitation.

“I hope that they can work it out, but if it doesn’t get worked out, it’s also not the end of the world,” Huang said, noting that Anthropic is not the only AI company in the world and the Department of Justice is not the only customer. 

Anthropic was founded in 2021 by a group of former OpenAI researchers and executives, and it’s best known for developing a family of AI models called Claude. The company was awarded a $200 million contract with the DoD last year.

Anthropic and Nvidia signed a strategic partnership in November. The Claude maker adopted Nvidia’s technology architecture and received a $5 billion investment commitment from the chip designer.

– CNBC’s Ashley Capoot and Kate Rooney contributed to this story