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Nvidia at CES 2018: Watch CEO Jensen Huang tonight at 8 p.m. PT

Nvidia's founder and CEO delivers the first major press conference of 2018's biggest electronics show.

Wayne Cunningham Managing Editor / Roadshow
Wayne Cunningham reviews cars and writes about automotive technology for CNET's Roadshow. Prior to the automotive beat, he covered spyware, Web building technologies, and computer hardware. He began covering technology and the Web in 1994 as an editor of The Net magazine.
Wayne Cunningham
2 min read

Continuing what has become a CES tradition, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang kicks off the week of the show with a Sunday night press conference. While the company once held gaming enthusiasts spell-bound with its graphics card announcements, in recent years it has pivoted largely to automotive, tackling the intense computational challenge presented by self-driving cars .

At last year's conference, Huang introduced a whole new chip called Xavier, a 9 billion transistor powerhouse designed to analyze sensor data and make decisions for self-driving cars. Late last year the company announced Pegasus, a computer using two Xavier chips and two of Nvidia's graphic processors tailor made to fit in cars. Those type of announcements are likely what will continue for CES 2018, showing how self-driving car development has been proceeding.

Home electronics are likely still to play a part as well. Last year, Nvidia made an effort in the home virtual assistant space with the Spot, but new versions of the Amazon Echo and the Google Home stole its thunder. Nvidia still has a horse in the gaming electronics space, so also look for new announcements there.

Beyond the technology announcements, Huang's unique, unscripted style always makes for a refreshing show. Eschewing light shows and paid performers unrelated to the company, Huang better fits the role of excited techie, animatedly explaining the merits and uses of Nvidia's technology with a complete command of the details.

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