NVidia, the videocard company who has one of their cards in more than 50% of you readers, made it official today that it was buying AGEIA. The behind-the-scenes talks have been going on for some time, as they all do, but it's expected to finish on February 13th.

Does this mean we'll be getting single graphics cards with physics processors in them? No more using up another PCI slot or space in your case for that extra card and fans? Can't say yet, because it may not even be possible. Not on a cutting edge graphics card, at least.

Then again, it would probably take at least six months to see any progress towards that anyways, so don't think too hard about how much such a card would cost. Though with such a deal at hand, it may be interesting to think about the future of consoles, who have neglected physics cards so far. Maybe now, with both Microsoft and Sony using NVIDIA exclusively on their consoles, we may see something brewing in the future in the hardware department, not just software.

Here's the full press release:

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.

[Image by Adam Pisani]