Nvidia and Caterpillar announced a partnership to embed Nvidia’s Jetson Thor physical‑AI platform into Caterpillar’s construction equipment, unveiling the Cat AI assistant at CES 2026. The announcement was made on January 6, 2026.
The Cat AI system is being tested on a Cat 306 CR Mini Excavator. It uses a fleet of AI agents that answer operator questions, provide safety tips, and schedule maintenance, transmitting roughly 2,000 messages per second back to Caterpillar for real‑time analytics.
Caterpillar will also use Nvidia’s Omniverse simulation library to create digital twins of construction sites, enabling advanced scheduling and material‑usage optimization. The partnership expands Nvidia’s physical‑AI strategy beyond robotics and autonomous vehicles into the heavy‑equipment sector, opening a new industrial‑AI market that could generate recurring revenue from hardware, software, and data services.
“In the age of AI, NVIDIA and Caterpillar are partnering across the full spectrum—from autonomous construction fleets to the AI data centers powering the next industrial revolution,” said Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA. “The ChatGPT moment for physical AI has arrived.” Caterpillar CEO Joe Creed added that the collaboration accelerates digital transformation and helps address labor shortages by enabling less experienced operators to work more safely and efficiently.
The deal underscores Nvidia’s strategy to build a comprehensive ecosystem of hardware, software, and services, deepening its moat and providing a new source of recurring revenue. For Caterpillar, the partnership signals a commitment to Industry 4.0, leveraging digital twins and AI to improve productivity, safety, and fleet management.
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