Nvidia cancels AI Summit in Tel Aviv following Hamas attack on Israel

Nvidia canceled its AI conference in Tel Aviv next week due to safety concerns, as Israel ordered a siege of Gaza following the Hamas attack on Israel over the weekend.

Nvidia had scheduled its in-person AI summit, with a keynote by CEO Jensen Huang, for Oct. 15 and 16 in Tel Aviv, billing the event as “the #1 conference for developers, business leaders, and AI researchers.” In a blog post leading up to the event, Nvidia highlighted Israel’s more than 6,000 startups and amount of VC investments per capita, making it “one of the world’s most vibrant technology hubs.”

Nvidia, the world’s largest AI chipmaker, can’t keep up with industrywide demand for its chips. Revenue spiked more than 100% year over year for its second fiscal quarter — along with $6.7 billion in net income, a 422% year-over-year increase. In Huang’s summit keynote, he planned to discuss Nvidia’s latest in generative AI and cloud computing.

About 2,500 developers, researchers and tech workers were set to attend the two-day conference, Nvidia confirmed to CNBC, and it was set to feature more than 60 live sessions on topics ranging from generative AI, supercomputing and large language models, to autonomous vehicles, health care and cybersecurity.

Most of the summit’s planned speakers are key figures at Nvidia, such as Kimberly Powell, vice president of health care; Deepu Talla, vice president of embedded and edge computing; and Gilad Shainer, senior vice president of networking and high-performance computing. Executives from Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, Snowflake and Lenovo were also set to lead sessions, some sponsored.

“We regret to inform you that due to the current situation in Israel, we have decided to cancel AI SUMMIT,” Nvidia announced on the event’s website. “Our hearts go out to all those affected by the situation. The safety and wellbeing of our participants are our top priority, and we believe this is the best course of action to ensure everyone’s safety.”