The company's CEO said he's already sold 90 percent of what he can supply this year by taking orders that he won't allow to be canceled.

Government approval in China and elsewhere may come later this year or in 2022, Jensen Huang said.

Taking it private, the deal would open a new chapter for a once high-flying software firm that struggled to sustain growth.

It will look to unlock value in infrastructure assets such as towers, satellites, cables and data centers that may involve possible sales.

Data center chip sales were up 80 percent and gaming revenue doubled in Nvidia's fiscal first quarter.

Cloud infrastructure costs likely went up because the pandemic drove up demand for cloud services.