Nvidia is reportedly in talks over a potential acquisition of Rebellions, the South Korean AI semiconductor startup valued at $2.3 billion and backed by Saudi Aramco’s venture capital arm, Wa’ed Ventures.

The potential transaction would bring one of Asia’s rapidly growing AI chip startups into Nvidia’s portfolio at a time when demand for specialized computing infrastructure is expanding beyond AI training into inference and reasoning workloads.

Rebellions develops AI processors designed primarily for data centers and has expanded commercially across South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Japan and the United States.

The discussions come as Rebellions is also preparing for a potential initial public offering, creating two possible paths for the company as it enters its next stage of growth.

From $1.4 Billion to $2.3 Billion Valuation

Rebellions has raised more than $850 million in total funding as investors increase their exposure to companies developing alternatives and complementary technologies within the global AI semiconductor market.

In 2025, the company raised $250 million in Series C funding at a $1.4 billion valuation, with participation from major semiconductor and technology companies including Samsung, SK Hynix and Arm.

Its valuation subsequently climbed to $2.3 billion following a $400 million funding round in March 2026.

The capital has supported Rebellions as it develops chips optimized for AI workloads and expands into international markets.

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Saudi Aramco Backed Rebellions’ Expansion Into the Kingdom

Rebellions also has a notable connection to Saudi Arabia through Wa’ed Ventures, the venture capital arm backed by Saudi Aramco.

Wa’ed Ventures invested $15 million in Rebellions in July 2024, with the investment supporting the semiconductor company’s expansion into Saudi Arabia.

The move gave Saudi capital exposure to one of the most strategically important layers of the AI economy: the semiconductor infrastructure required to run increasingly sophisticated artificial intelligence models.

Rebellions has since developed a commercial presence in the Kingdom alongside operations and customers in other major international markets.

For Saudi Arabia, the potential Nvidia transaction could also highlight a broader investment strategy in which Saudi-backed funds are gaining early exposure to international companies building critical AI infrastructure.

Why Rebellions Could Matter to Nvidia

Rebellions specializes in chips targeting AI inference and reasoning, areas becoming increasingly important as artificial intelligence moves from training large models toward deploying them at scale.

Training remains extraordinarily compute-intensive, but the rapid adoption of generative and agentic AI is also increasing demand for processors capable of efficiently running models and executing inference workloads inside data centers.

A potential acquisition could therefore give Nvidia additional specialized capabilities as competition intensifies across the AI semiconductor industry.

For Rebellions, joining Nvidia would represent a dramatically different route from proceeding independently toward the public markets.

IPO Plans Now Face a Potential Alternative

Rebellions has been preparing for an initial public offering, but acquisition discussions with Nvidia could potentially alter that trajectory if negotiations result in a transaction.

No completed acquisition has been announced, and the discussions therefore remain a potential deal rather than a confirmed transaction.

The outcome will be closely watched given Rebellions’ rapid increase in valuation, substantial institutional backing and strategic position in AI semiconductor infrastructure.

Saudi Capital Moves Deeper Into the Global AI Stack

The Rebellions story also illustrates how Saudi investment is increasingly moving beyond applications and software into the underlying infrastructure powering artificial intelligence.

Through its investment in Rebellions, Wa’ed Ventures backed a semiconductor company before its valuation reached its current $2.3 billion level and as it was beginning to establish a stronger presence in the Kingdom.

If Nvidia ultimately acquires Rebellions, the transaction would place an Aramco-backed AI chipmaker at the center of one of the global semiconductor industry’s most closely watched strategic moves.

More broadly, Rebellions’ expansion into Saudi Arabia connects South Korea’s semiconductor ecosystem with the Kingdom’s rapidly growing ambitions around AI infrastructure, data centers and advanced computing.

With Nvidia now reportedly considering an acquisition while Rebellions simultaneously prepares for an IPO, the next step could determine whether the $2.3 billion startup continues its independent expansion or becomes part of the world’s dominant AI computing company.

Indian financial technology company Navi has raised $100 million from global technology investor Prosus, valuing the company at approximately $1.3 billion as it prepares for its next phase of growth and a potential public listing.

The investment represents Navi’s first external institutional funding round since the company was founded nearly eight years ago.

Founded in 2018 by Sachin Bansal, the former Co-Founder and CEO of Flipkart, Navi has developed a broad digital financial services ecosystem spanning payments, lending, insurance and mutual funds in the Indian market.

Bansal launched Navi following his departure from Flipkart after Walmart acquired a controlling stake in the Indian e-commerce company in a $16 billion deal.

The latest transaction brings Prosus onto Navi’s shareholder base and comes as the FinTech company reportedly prepares another attempt to enter the public markets.

Navi Eyes IPO After Previous $440M Listing Plan

Navi is reportedly considering an initial public offering that could raise approximately $314 million, or INR 30 billion.

It would mark the company’s second attempt to pursue a public listing.

Navi filed for an IPO worth approximately $440 million in 2022, but abandoned the plan the following year as conditions in public markets deteriorated.

The $1.3 billion valuation attached to the latest Prosus investment is also below the approximately $2 billion valuation Navi had reportedly sought while exploring institutional investment in 2024.

The new capital therefore arrives at an important stage for the company as it combines renewed IPO ambitions with continued expansion across multiple financial services businesses.

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From Lending to Nearly One Billion Monthly UPI Transactions

Lending represents a major part of Navi’s operations through Navi Finserv, which currently manages more than $1.4 billion in assets.

The company has also emerged as a significant player in India’s massive digital payments market through its UPI-based payments app.

Navi has become the fourth-largest UPI payments app by transaction volume, behind Walmart-owned PhonePe, Google Pay and Paytm.

The app processed more than 947 million transactions in July 2026, representing approximately $5.05 billion in transaction value.

Its growing payments footprint gives Navi access to a large consumer base that the company can potentially serve with additional products across lending, insurance and investments.

The strategy reflects Bansal’s broader ambition to build Navi into an integrated digital financial institution rather than a single-product FinTech platform.

Navi Generated $323M Revenue in FY2026

For the financial year ending March 2026, Navi generated approximately $323.3 million in revenue, while its net loss increased to around $48.7 million.

Despite the full-year loss, the company said its consolidated operations reached profitability during the fourth quarter of FY2026.

Bansal has financed much of Navi’s development himself since its establishment, committing hundreds of millions of dollars of personal capital to the business.

Prosus now becomes a major external institutional backer as Navi seeks to translate its growing position across payments and lending into a broader financial services platform.

Bansal said the Prosus investment provides strong backing for the financial institution Navi is building, while highlighting the investor’s global experience scaling technology companies.

For Navi, the $100 million round opens a new chapter after years of founder-funded growth. The company now enters that phase with a $1.3 billion valuation, nearly a billion monthly UPI transactions and renewed ambitions to access public markets.

Indian hyperscale data center company CtrlS Datacenters has raised ₹250 crore, around US$26 million, from Zerodha co-founder Nikhil Kamath and entrepreneur Sreeram Reddy Vanga to expand its infrastructure and computing capacity.

Kamath invested ₹200 crore in the company, while Vanga contributed ₹50 crore. CtrlS plans to deploy the fresh capital toward increasing its data center capacity as it responds to growing infrastructure requirements from enterprises and large technology companies across India.

The company currently operates 19 data centers across nine Indian markets, representing more than 370 MW of capacity, and has a further 4.4 GW of projects at various stages of development.

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Scaling Infrastructure for AI and Cloud Demand

Founded by Sridhar Pinnapureddy, CtrlS develops and operates hyperscale and AI-ready data centers serving large enterprises, cloud providers, financial institutions and government organizations.

The company expects demand for computing infrastructure to continue expanding as businesses increase their use of artificial intelligence, cloud services and other digital technologies.

Founder and CEO Sridhar Pinnapureddy said CtrlS has been built around a long-term view of India’s digital economy and the infrastructure required to support its growth.

He said the alignment with the company’s new investors gives CtrlS greater scope to accelerate its plans and develop data center platforms capable of supporting India’s next phase of digital expansion.

The new investment will help the company add infrastructure and capacity as workloads become increasingly compute-intensive and businesses require larger, more reliable facilities to operate digital services.

Nikhil Kamath Backs India’s Data Center Expansion

Kamath’s ₹200 crore investment accounts for the majority of the new capital and reflects a broader bet on the physical infrastructure underpinning emerging technologies.

Kamath said major technology shifts expected over the next decade, including AI, cloud computing and digital public infrastructure, will all depend on data centers.

He described India as being at an inflection point where supporting infrastructure will need to keep pace with technology adoption to avoid becoming a constraint on future growth.

Sreeram Reddy Vanga invested the remaining ₹50 crore in the round, bringing the combined investment to ₹250 crore.

Building a Larger Hyperscale Footprint

CtrlS focuses its data center operations on reliability, security, operational efficiency and sustainability. Its facilities are designed to support enterprise and hyperscale workloads as well as the growing computing requirements associated with AI.

The company’s existing footprint of 19 facilities spans nine major markets in India, giving it more than 370 MW of operational capacity.

Its development pipeline is considerably larger. CtrlS says approximately 4.4 GW of additional data center projects are currently at different stages of development, indicating the scale of infrastructure the company intends to bring online over time.

The latest capital will support that expansion as India’s digital economy generates greater demand for data storage and computing capacity.

For CtrlS, the investment provides additional resources to build out the physical infrastructure behind that growth, particularly as AI and cloud workloads increase the scale and performance requirements placed on data centers.