NVIDIA 2015 Annual Report Download - page 109

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Recent Developments, Future Objectives and Challenges
GPU Business
During fiscal year 2015, we announced and shipped GeForce GPUs based on our new Maxwell architecture and we
surpassed fifty million installations of our GeForce Experience client, which provides game-ready drivers, optimized play
settings, and streaming and sharing of gameplay. We also disclosed the first details of our Pascal GPU architecture, which
will succeed Maxwell. Pascal is expected to feature 3D memory and NVLink interconnect technology.
Quadro professional graphics continue to maintain market leadership. We refreshed our Quadro product lineup during
fiscal year 2015 and also extended our product lineup to include Maxwell-based GPUs.
We extended our reach in accelerated datacenter computing, with the world’s fifteen most highly-efficient
supercomputers all utilizing our Tesla GPUs. We continued to expand our reach in the big data analytics market, with IBM
announcing future support for GPU acceleration in its IBM DB2 with BLU acceleration. We launched our Tesla K80 dual-
GPU accelerator, which is designed to power a wide range of machine learning, data-analytics and high performance
computing applications. In addition, we announced that our Tesla GPUs will power the U.S. Department of Energy’s next-
generation supercomputers in conjunction with our NVIDIA NVLink high-speed interconnect technology. These systems
are to be deployed at Oak Ridge and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories and will serve scientists to accelerate their
research.
We announced that NVIDIA GRID technology will be available on the VMware Horizon DaaS Platform to deliver 3D
graphics on virtualized desktops and applications delivered through the cloud, partnered with VMware on a customer access
program for NVIDIA GRID with companies like Airbus, CH2M Hill, MetroHealth and Halliburton, and announced that
the new version of VMware’s virtualization suite, VMware Horizon 6, includes the capability to deliver scalable, virtualized
3D graphics enabled by NVIDIA GRID vGPU. NVIDIA GRID graphics virtualization continued to gain momentum as
more companies come forward to experience cloud-based GPU-accelerated virtual desktops through our “Try GRID” online
demonstration.
Tegra Processor Business
During fiscal year 2015, we expanded our SHIELD family of gaming devices, adding the SHIELD tablet and SHIELD
wireless controller to the product family that also includes the SHIELD portable. We also launched our GRID On-Demand
Streaming Service, providing it free for SHIELD users through June 30, 2015.
We announced the NVIDIA Tegra X1 mobile processor, a 256-core Maxwell architecture-based mobile super chip with
over one teraflops of computing power. Our Tegra K1 processor was featured in Google’s Nexus 9 and Project Tango tablets,
in NVIDIA's SHIELD tablet and in Chromebooks made by Acer and HP, and was one of the first processors to support
Android TV. Tegra K1 was also included in our launch of Jetson TK1, a development platform aimed at automotive, robotics,
defense and embedded applications.
In automotive, we launched NVIDIA DRIVE automotive computers - a computing platform for advanced driver
assistance systems and digital cockpits that could enable auto-piloted cars and run state of the art infotainment systems.
NVIDIA DRIVE is powered by the Tegra X1. We also announced that many automobile manufacturers were shipping
various new models with infotainment systems powered by NVIDIA, including the BMW i8 and i3, the Volkswagen Golf
and Passat, and the Honda Civic, Civic Tourer and CR-V.
Capital Return to Shareholders
During fiscal year 2015, we repurchased 44.4 million shares of our common stock for $813.6 million and paid $186.5
million in cash dividends. As a result, we returned $1.00 billion to shareholders during fiscal year 2015 in the form of share
repurchases and dividend payments.