Nvidia today announced its plans to acquire Cumulus Networks, an open-source-centric company that specializes in helping enterprises optimize their data center networking stack. With Cumulus Express, the company also offers a hardware solution in the form of its own data center switch.

NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) reported robust fiscal first-quarter 2021 results after the market close on Thursday, May 21.  The graphics processing unit (GPU) specialist's revenue jumped 39% year over year to $3.

Nvidia expects operating costs to rise to $4.1 billion as it absorbs last year's Mellanox acquisition, with some analysts trimming earnings 2020 earnings forecasts as a result.

Keep an eye on disclosures regarding server and gaming GPU demand, as well as any comments shared about Mellanox's performance, when Nvidia reports on Thursday.

Nvidia stock reached a record high on Monday following its recent purchase of Mellanox Technologies. At least two Wall Street analysts raised their price targets on the chipmaker.

Mellanox® Technologies, Ltd. (NASDAQ: MLNX), a leading supplier of high-performance, end-to-end interconnect solutions for data center servers and storage systems, today announced preliminary financial results for its first quarter 2020.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told investors that the chipmaker lies at the center of permanent, "structural" changes in technology.

Mellanox (MLNX) is well positioned to outperform the market, as it exhibits above-average growth in financials.

The deal closed on Monday after a lengthy regulatory review.

Analysts raised their price target on Nvidia to $350 citing the completed acquisition of Mellanox as a strong positive for the stock.

NVDA earnings call for the period ending April 26, 2020.

NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) is scheduled to report its fiscal year 2021 first-quarter results May 21 after the close. Ahead of the results, and following the recent strong run in the shares, an analyst at Needham hiked their Nvidia price target to a Street-high number.The Nvidia Analyst Analyst Rajvindra Gill maintained a Buy rating and increased the price target from $270 to $360. (See his track record here )The Nvidia Thesis The positive Nvidia story hinges on three pillars, Gill said in a Monday note: the chipmaker's recently completed Mellanox acquisition, strong gaming sales and solid data center performance. (See his track record here.)The analyst said Mellanox results have improved meaningfully since Nvidia announced its intention to acquire the Israeli chipmaker in March 2019.Mellanox's revenues came in at $1.3 billion in 2019, the non-GAAP gross margin was at 68.3% and non-GAAP operating income was $384 million, he said. Needham anticipates that Mellanox will add 85 cents per share to fiscal 2021 EPS and hiked its 2021 EPS estimate from $7.05 to $7.90.Gill said he expects upside to Nvidia's gaming segment thanks to the stay-at-home economy that boosted discrete GPU sales; growing ray-tracing adoption in leading games such as "Call of Duty," "Madden NFL," "Battlefield,"; and strong NINTENDO LTD/ADR (OTC: NTDOY) Switch sales.The analyst is also positive about the data center segment."We expect data center (31% of F4Q20 sales), which is NVDA's largest growth driver, to continue benefiting from increased demand for both public and private clouds due to the ramp of data consumption in the cloud," the analyst said. Needham also noted an acceleration in the migration of data from on-premise to the hybrid and public clouds.NVDA Price Action At last check, Nvidia shares were rising by 3.65% to $323.90. Related Links:'Fast Money' Picks For May 11: EA, Nike, Nvidia Nvidia, Marvell, Monolithic Are Oppenheimer's Top Picks Ahead Of Semiconductor Earnings Latest Ratings for NVDA DateFirmActionFromTo May 2020NeedhamMaintainsBuy May 2020SunTrust Robinson HumphreyMaintainsBuy May 2020SusquehannaMaintainsPositive View More Analyst Ratings for NVDA View the Latest Analyst Ratings See more from Benzinga * Nvidia Reportedly Eyeing 5nm Chips Even As Apple, AMD Ramp Up Orders * Nvidia, Marvell, Monolithic Are Oppenheimer's Top Picks Ahead Of Semiconductor Earnings * Despite Near-Term Volatility, Nvidia Analyst Remains Bullish On Data Center Positioning, Gaming Dominance(C) 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.

NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) reported strong fiscal year 2021 first-quarter results Thursday after the close, sending the chipmaker's stock higher Friday. The Nvidia Analysts UBS Securities analyst Timothy Arcuri maintained a Buy rating on Nvidia shares and raised the price target from $330 to $400.BofA Securities analyst Vivek Arya reiterated a Buy rating and increased the price target from $360 to $420.Oppenheimer analyst Rick Schafer reiterated an Outperform rating and lifted the price target from $350 to $400.Mizuho Securities analyst Vijay Rakesh reiterated a Buy rating and increased the price target from $295 to $400.Wedbush analyst Matthew Bryson maintained an Outperform rating and raised the price target from $340 to $420.Raymond James analyst Chris Caso reiterated a Buy rating and moved up the price target from $330 to $370.RBC Capital Markets analyst Mitch Steves maintained an Outperform rating and $385 price target.Rosenblatt Securities analyst Hans Mosesmann maintained a Buy rating and lifted the price target from $340 to $400.Needham analyst Rajvindra Gill maintained a Buy rating and increased the price target from $360 to $400.Nvidia Is a Franchise Holding, UBS Says Nvidia's report delivered solid guidance and framed the new 7nm product cycle against the transformational longer-term opportunity around Mellanox, Arcuri said in a Friday note.The Ampere GPU brings the biggest generational leap in computational horsepower in Nvidia's history, blurring the lines between its training and inference opportunities, the analyst said. UBS still sees Nvidia as a franchise holding, with some headroom as the transformational aspects of Mellanox and the Ampere product cycles take hold.BofAOn Why Nvidia Is Its Top Sector Pick Nvidia's multi-cylinder growth in the wake of EPS growth potential in cloud/AI/networking/5G, synergistic Mellanox/Cumulus acquisitions, disruptive Ampere-based pipeline and best-in-class execution makes it a top sector pick for BofA, Arya said in a Thursday note. The analyst noted that first-quarter sales climbed 39% year-over-year to $3.08 billion, ahead of the consensus, and the second-quarter organic implied sales outlook of $3.15 billion is toward the high end of the consensus.Arya expects year-over-year data center sales growth to accelerate from 80% in the first quarter to 90% in the second quarter as the mix changes to Ampere.BofA also highlighted the company's stellar gross margin execution, which came in at a record 66% despite the start of the transition to new Ampere GPU architecture.See also: Here's How Long It Took Nvidia To Reach A 0B Market Cap Nvidia's Growth, Margin Story Remains, Oppenheimer Says The data center growth was led by growing adoption of AI accelerators for training/inference with T4 (inference) doubling year-over-year, Schafer said in a Friday note. View more earnings on NVDAThe analyst sees COVID-19 as a continuing drag, particularly for Auto and Pro Visualization. The second quarter is likely to be the trough for autos, he said. The Ampere GPU bolsters Nvidia's AI lead, while the Mellanox acquisition expands its data center footprint, Schafer said. "We expect management to introduce Ampere for GeForce in 2H, furthering leadership in high-performance gaming." Oppenheimer sees the growth/margin story as continuing. Nvidia Well-Positioned For Calendar 2020 and Beyond, Mizuho Says The April quarter top-line was driven by strong data center and gaming, which was up 27%, Rakesh said in a Friday note.Nvidia sees continued data center and gaming strength in the second quarter, with a new hybrid training and inferencing platform with Ampere A100 GPU ramping combined with the Mellanox contribution, the analyst said. Mizuho is of the view that continued strong gaming and AI leadership in data center positions NVDA well for 2020 and beyond.Nvidia To Enjoy Outpaced Growth For Foreseeable Future, Wedbush Says Wedbush said a combination of leadership in both AI and gaming silicon will allow Nvidia to enjoy outpaced growth for the foreseeable future, particularly with Ampere positioned to potentially accelerate data center growth by allowing the company to penetrate new markets such as Big Data Analytics and Edge AI, Bryson said in a Friday note. The analyst noted that data center achieved the quarterly run rate of $1 billion, thanks to strong 80% growth, and gaming revenues came in-line. As negatives, he highlighted the higher-than-expected interest expense and the worse-than-expected 40% decline the company forecast.RayJay Favors Nvidia In A Post-COVID World Despite the COVID-19 impact, Nvidia posted strong results and guidance, as gaming proved resilient and the new Ampere product contributed solidly to the data center segment, Caso said in a Thursday note. The analyst said he has high conviction in the strength of NVIDIA's product cycles -- data center followed by gaming in the second half."And those product cycles are more resistant to macro conditions than most anything else in our space, which is why we have and continue to favor the stock in a post-Covid world." Margin Expansion Opportunity Justifies Nvidia's Multiple, RBC Says While the quarter was strong, the guidance was a tad light when adjusted for Mellanox, Steves said in a Thursday note.The analyst presented investor feedback on the results, with some investors suggesting they anticipated better quarter-over-quarter data center growth guidance.Gaming will likely have further upside if work-from-home continues and gross and operating margins have not peaked, helping justify the current multiple, the analyst said, citing investors.Rosenblatt Recommends Nvidia As Accelerated Computing Pure Play Nvidia easily sidestepped COVID-19-related disruption in gaming and is delivering a strong ramp of the new 7nm-based Ampere A100 in data center, which was reflected in the first-quarter beat and the strong second-quarter guidance, Mosesmann said in a Friday note. "We recommend NVDA as a pure-play in accelerated computing that is in the early stages of evolution as AI-based applications broaden from the cloud to the edge and beyond," the analyst said. Needham Bullish On Nvidia As Nvidia further integrates Mellanox, its positioning with enterprise data center customers will improve, as it will be able to provide a complete cloud offering consisting of HPC and networking hardware and software, Gill said in a Friday note. The analyst said he remains bullish on NVDA's positioning in data center, both in training and inference, coupled with its continued dominance in gaming.NVDA Price Action At last check, Nvidia shares were adding 2.24% to $358.88 and have gained about 50% year-to-date. Related Link: Nvidia Analyst Says New, Ampere-Based Data Center GPU Makes Chipmaker 'Unassailable'Photo courtesy of Nvidia. Latest Ratings for NVDA DateFirmActionFromTo May 2020CascendMaintainsBuy May 2020Piper SandlerMaintainsOverweight May 2020UBSMaintainsBuy View More Analyst Ratings for NVDA View the Latest Analyst Ratings See more from Benzinga * Here's How Long It Took Nvidia To Reach A 0B Market Cap * Nvidia Investors Accuse Chipmaker Of Misrepresenting B In Crypto Revenue In Lawsuit * BMO Turns Bullish On Nvidia, Says It's Uniquely Positioned For Computing Shift(C) 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.

Long gone are the days of NVIDIA (NASDAQ: NVDA) the "video game company." In the graphics processing unit (GPU) pioneer's first quarter of fiscal 2021 (the three months ended April 26, 2020), another segment was nearly as large as video games: data centers. With the long-awaited purchase of Mellanox closing on the first day of Q2, data centers could wind up being the largest reporting segment at NVIDIA from this point forward.

Nvidia's recently approved acquisition of Mellanox is poised to push earnings higher, according to an analyst. Shares of Nvidia rose 3.2% on Monday to $322.37, a record high, after Needham analyst Rajvindra S. Gill raised his price target for its shares to $360, writing that the deal will be "highly accretive." Gill pointed to strong revenue growth at Mellanox, which sells computer networking products.

Nvidia Corporation (NASDAQ: NVDA) chief executive officer Jensen Huang on Monday told CNBC that the company's acquisition of Mellanox Technologies Ltd. (NASDAQ: MLNX) is a "homerun deal."What Happened "Man, I've been dreaming about this," Huang said, as Nvidia announced the completion of the acquisition earlier in the day.An agreement of acquisition was reached in March last year between the two companies, but regulatory approval delayed the closing.Mellanox has a significant business in China, including with Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd. (NYSE: BABA) and Baidu Inc. (NYSE: BIDU), and as trade tensions between the United States and China heightened, the latter withheld the approval until April 16, according to CNBC.Huang noted that the merger will improve Huang's infrastructure footing."We're combining the leaders of AI computing and high speed networking and data processing into one company and, so, this is really quite extraordinary," he told the CNBC "Mad Money" host Jim Cramer.Nvidia had beaten Intel Corporation (NASDAQ: INTC) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) in the race to acquire Mellanox back in 2019, as reported by TechCrunch at the time, and the deal's completion will help the company better compete with its rivals.Price Action Nvidia's shares closed 2.6% higher at $297.08 on Monday. The shares traded about 0.7% higher at $299.00 in the after-hours session.Photo Credit: NVIDIA Taiwan via Wikimedia.See more from Benzinga * Deutsche Bank Says Q1 Results Will Beat Market Estimates * Starbucks Partners With Sequoia To Make 'Strategic Co-Investments' In China * Bill Gates, Backer of Inovio And Six Others, Says Coronavirus Vaccine Could Be Mass Produced Within A Year(C) 2020 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.

NVIDIA (NVDA) receives the long-awaited green signal from China's antitrust authority for its year-long pending acquisition of Mellanox.

Nvidia delivered strong Q1 2021 results, where its revenue was up 39% compared with the same period a year ago.

Graphics-chip maker Nvidia expects to close its acquisition of Mellanox Technologies by April 27 now that Chinese regulators have approved the $6.9 billion deal following a lengthy review process.

Mellanox (MLNX) delivered earnings and revenue surprises of 50.58% and 23.98%, respectively, for the quarter ended March 2020. Do the numbers hold clues to what lies ahead for the stock?