Open Source: Nvidia is a $2 trillion company. And it’s hiring in Durham.

Remember last spring when Nvidia surpassed a trillion dollars market cap? Well, the California chipmaker is now worth nearly twice that. With its dizzying stock ascent, Nvidia is now the world’s fourth-most valuable company behind Microsoft, Apple and the Saudi Arabian Oil Group.

Microsoft has offices in the North Carolina Triangle. Apple does, too (though we’re waiting on the big promised campus). The Saudi oil group to my knowledge does not.

But Nvidia is here, in Durham, and it’s hiring. On LinkedIn, the company lists 51 openings with the Bull City as an option, alongside cities like Austin, Santa Clara, and Redmond, Washington. Some of the openings were posted just this week. Many are for different types of senior engineers.

The company has been in North Carolina since 1998, company filings show, and Durham is now one of its 20 U.S. offices.

Nvidia makes processing chips called graphics processing units, or GPUs, which work with other chips, called CPUs, to perform more complex computations. For most of its history, Nvidia GPUs were used to power video games; the original Xbox, for example, exclusively used the company’s chips.

Companies big and small now have an insatiable appetite for Nvidia chips to power their expanding AI platforms. I hope employees have been getting paid in stock options. Since Jan 1., Nvidia stock is up 65%. Since this time last year, it’s risen 252%.

Last week, its market cap briefly eclipsed $2 trillion. Companywide, its headcount has swelled, too. At the start of 2020, Nvidia had 13,775 employees. As of late January, it employed 29,600.

How many of those workers are in the Triangle? In May, Nvidia told me it had around 300 workers based at its Meridian Parkway office near Research Triangle Park. Last week, I asked for an updated area headcount and initially got rebuffed by a company spokesperson who said, in an apparent change in policy, that Nvidia doesn’t “disclose numbers by location.”

I pushed to ask if 300 was still an accurate local employment figure, and the spokesperson said yes.

“We’re a growing company and will continue to expand our presence in various industries including health care, automotive, and more,” she said.

So Nvidia’s Durham footprint isn’t massive yet. But the company is here. And it is hiring. It stands to reason its Durham workforce will grow. Whether Nvidia gives us details seems less certain.

On to the rest of this week’s news.

Jobs deal comes, job deals go

Every other Tuesday often turn into busy days for North Carolina business reporters. That is when the state’s Economic Investment Committee generally meets to approve new economic incentives or terminate previous deals. This week was no exception, with North Carolina doing both. First the good news, the EIC approved a grant for the Japanese pharma company Kyowa Kirin to bring 102 jobs to the Lee County city of Sanford.

Japanese businesses and the Tar Heel State have had a strong relationship dating back to the 1970s. Gov. Roy Cooper’s team boasts his trip last fall to the East Asian country has helped North Carolina land multiple recent economic projects.

Now the less positive news. On Tuesday, the EIC canceled incentive grants for Clorox in Durham and Syneos Health in Wake County. Both companies cited the rise of remote work among the reasons they weren’t going to reach their initial hiring commitments. Clorox appears to also be divesting from its vitamin/supplements division.

Honestly, both Clorox and Syneos have larger area workforces than I realized. Syneos, a contract research organization, has its global headquarters in Morrisville, where it employs around 2,000. Clorox says it still has more than 500 employees in the Durham area, including at the Burt’s Bees headquarters.

Election years are good years for Bandwidth

It’s an election year, which means Raleigh’s Bandwidth will be busy. The telecommunications software company provides mass messaging services — text and voice — for candidates. On an earnings call Wednesday, Bandwidth’s chief financial officer Daryl Raiford said the company projects “political campaign messaging and associated surcharges” to contribute $40 million in revenue.

And Bandwidth had a good week overall, with earnings beating expectations, sending its stock up 65%.

“In 2024, we expect our growth in commercial messaging to be joined by further benefit from the U.S. election season, where our capabilities uniquely serve many longstanding customers,” company CEO David Morken told investors.

Tillis talks taxes in WSJ

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis said he would reject the Wyden-Smith Tax Bill that passed the House a month ago. “House Republicans let themselves get played by Democrats seeking to expand the welfare state,” he wrote. Tillis objects to how the legislation approaches the child tax credit — who would be eligible for the program and how Congress would fund it.

In his opinion piece, Tillis didn’t mention the North Carolina startups that are staring down bankruptcy due to a recent accounting change to Section 174 of the federal tax code, which Wyden-Smith would address. This is disappointing, says Evan Garland, a business consultant in Raleigh who has led a lobbying effort to reform Section 174.

“I feel it remains important for these companies’ voices be heard, as a counterpoint,” she told me in an email. .

Short Stuff: Robots, haircuts and sports betting

Bits and bytes. A handful of Triangle restaurants have debuted robots to bring food to tables. They’re hits at a pho place in Morrisville, a seafood spot in Rocky Mount, and a Mexican restaurant in Wake Forest.

Over/under 7,000 commercials. Sports betting goes statewide March 11. I’ve been seeing a lot of North Carolina-specific ads from Fanduel and Draft Kings spokespeople like comedian Kevin Hart and former Duke star JJ Reddick.

City accommodations. Boxyard RTP, the Research Triangle’s de facto downtown, has welcomed several new businesses, including a barber shop, New Wave Capitol Suites, which opened mid-February. A nice addition for the Park’s employees — and its future residents.

National Tech Happenings

• The Federal Trade Commission is challenging Kroger’s attempt to acquire fellow giant supermarket chain Albertsons, arguing customers will suffer. The two companies disagree, arguing the competitive market now encompasses nontraditional grocers like Amazon. A decade ago, Kroger purchased Harris Teeter and later closed its Triangle-area Kroger stores.

• The Supreme Court is hearing arguments around Florida and Texas laws that limit how social media companies moderate their platforms. The states say they want to ensure political fairness. The Florida law prevents a platform from banning a candidate while the Texas law restricts the companies from removing political content.

• Can thermal batteries halve U.S. industrial heating costs? The startup Antora Energy raised $150 million to ramp up production.

Thanks for reading!