Nvidia says Sega’s $5 million Dreamcast‑era investment saved the company, and 30 years later the partnership is coming full circle

Developer July 22, 2026No Comments

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang seems to be everywhere these days, and there’s often an interesting tidbit of history that gets revealed during his appearances.

The latest comes from last week’s GiGO Akihabara arcade gaming event, where Huang made an appearance to help celebrate the institution’s historic relationship with Sega.

GeForce 💚 JapanJensen が GiGO 秋葉原 3 号館にてセガと共に『VIRTUA FIGHTER CROSSROADS』を紹介し、NVIDIA とセガの 30 年ものパートナーシップを振り返りました ✨ pic.twitter.com/6oP4csBNnSJuly 15, 2026

At the event, which was also attended by Sega’s current CEO, COO, and former president, Huang expressed his gratitude toward Sega (via Automaton Media) for helping make NVIDIA the tech giant that it is today.

I certainly never knew this, but Huang pins NVIDIA’s success today largely on an early investment from the Japanese gaming giant.

One of NVIDIA’s earliest mistakes nearly killed the company

Daytona USA Longplay (Arcade) [4K] – YouTube

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NVIDIA began its run in 1993 with Huang at the helm, with a focus on creating GPUs to power 3D games. Unfortunately, at the time, the only 3D games to be found were in arcades.

Daytona USA, one of Sega’s smash hits, arrived in North American arcades in 1994, and Huang explains that the NVIDIA team was addicted to the “beautiful 3D graphics and incredible sound.“

The game was so perfect that I started doubting whether it was actually rendered in 3D. But it really was a 3D game, and the texture mapping was flawless. It may well have been the first game in history to achieve that, and it ran at a smooth 60 fps. We were so inspired by Daytona USA that we knew we wanted to work with Sega.
Jensen Huang, NVIDIA CEO (via Automaton Media)

With a clear goal in mind, Huang’s NVIDIA received a stroke of good luck when it was asked by then Sega President Shoichiro Irimajiri to help create the Dreamcast console’s GPU.

This isn’t what saved NVIDIA. If anything, it nearly killed the company. After about nine months of collaboration, both sides of the partnership realized NVIDIA’s tech wasn’t going to be a good match for the Dreamcast.

As Huang explains, NVIDIA had been working on “forward texture mapping and curved surfaces,” but the Dreamcast needed “inverse texture mapping and polygons.

While we made the wrong technical decisions, I believe Irimajiri recognized that we were the right people for the job.
Jensen Huang, NVIDIA CEO (via Automaton Media)

Huang says he explained the predicament to Irimajiri plainly, and the two companies agreed to part ways. At least on the Dreamcast project.

Here’s where history could have gone two ways. Realizing his company was in dire need of funding, Huang asked Irimajiri and Sega for an investment package. It was approved, and Huang says without it, “the company likely wouldn’t exist today.“

Where would video games be without NVIDIA … and Sega?

NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang pegs his company’s early resilience on an investment from Sega. (Image credit: Getty Images | Chesnot)

Following Huang’s history lesson, he revealed the real reason for his visit to Japan. It appears that the Japanese government and NVIDIA are prepping an announcement for a major partnership involving AI and robotics.

Go figure. NVIDIA is currently the world’s most valuable company, and that value is built largely on the back of GPUs designed specifically for AI workloads.

As NVIDIA continues to print money with its AI sector, its gaming division has come under fire recently for its AI-soaked DLSS 5 upscaling technique.

I’ve been saying for years that AI in games isn’t going anywhere, but that doesn’t really make it a pill that’s any easier to swallow. No matter what you think about NVIDIA, the video game landscape probably wouldn’t look anything like it does today without the company that created CUDA and drove the ray tracing revolution with its RTX hardware.

And for that, we can thank an investment from Sega more than 30 years ago.