Preview|NVDA FY1Q27: Rubin’s Slight Delay due to Thermal Issues; 2027 CoWoS Upside Revision

Thermal Design Changes Lead to Slight Delay for Rubin

Rubin has experienced a several-week delay in its overall schedule due to modifications to its thermal design. This delay stems primarily from a massive surge in chip power consumption to 1800-2300W. The original plan to implement liquid metal for superior thermal conductivity faced leakage issues, forcing the final selection of thermal interface material (TIM2) to switch to a graphite design. Additionally, Nvidia altered the lid design in early May, shifting from the original dual-piece lid to a single-piece design. This series of thermal architecture changes and recalibrations—aimed at resolving liquid-metal leakage and structural reorganization—ultimately pushed back Rubin's volume production and shipment timeline by several weeks. Consequently, we have lowered Rubin’s shipment share for 2026.

2027 CoWoS Revised Upward

With TSMC shifting toward more aggressive capacity expansion (though supply remains severely short of demand), we now expect Nvidia to secure more CoWoS capacity in 2027. Therefore, even considering the slight shipment delay for Rubin in 2026 and the potential delay for Rubin Ultra, we have still marginally upwardly revised Nvidia's 2027 Data Center revenue forecast from $545bn to $554bn.

 

Financial Forecasts

We forecast FY1Q27/2Q27 revenue of $ 80.6bn/$91.2 bn and EPS of $ 1.87/$2.12. As for our full-year forecast, reflecting the Rubin delay and CoWoS upward revision, we now forecast Nvidia's FY2027/28 EPS to be $9.03/13.49, corresponding to a PE of 25.0/16.7x.