Jensen Huang resigned as CEO of Nvidia on November 12, marking an abrupt end to his tenure at the company he co-founded in 1993.
The departure followed an investigation launched by the company’s board of directors and the FBI into his personal conduct.
Leadership Transition
The company confirmed the search for a permanent successor is underway. Colette Kress, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, has been appointed Interim CEO.
She is supported by a leadership team instrumental in executing the company’s technology roadmap. “We will continue advancing the work that has made Nvidia a leader in accelerated computing and AI, and execute on the opportunities ahead. Our focus remains on serving our customers, partners, developers and shareholders,” said Kress.
Huang Resigns Following Investigations into Personal Affairs
Huang’s resignation was prompted by an investigation into an affair with a woman alleged to have been a Chinese spy, and a second affair with an executive at his own company. While the company remains valued at nearly $4 trillion, the uncertainty surrounding the leadership change has impacted the market.
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Huang, 63, has been married since 1985. The couple has two children, Madison and Spencer, both of whom serve in senior roles at the firm. Huang’s 3.6% stake in the company is a large personal asset, despite the recent loss of his leadership position.
Huang Rose from Humble Beginnings to Industry Prominence
Huang’s path to industry prominence began with humble origins. Born in Taiwan, he moved to the US in 1973 and attended the Oneida Baptist Institute in Kentucky, where he worked cleaning dormitory bathrooms. As a teenager, he worked at a Denny’s restaurant in Portland, performing duties as a dishwasher, busboy, and waiter.
“It teaches you humility, it teaches you hard work, it teaches you hospitality,” Jensen Huang said of his time at the diner chain. After earning an electrical engineering degree from Oregon State University in 1984, he worked as a microprocessor designer at AMD and later at LSI Logic. He earned a master’s degree from Stanford University in 1992.
The firm initially focused on graphics hardware, notably saving itself from failure after Huang made the decision to pivot away from a technical approach used for Sega. In 1999, the company released the GeForce 256, widely considered the world’s first GPU.
By 2012, Nvidia’s technology gained significance in the AI sector when researchers Alex Krizhevsky, Ilya Sutskever, and Geoffrey Hinton used its hardware to train AlexNet. Huang personally delivered the company’s first DGX-1 AI supercomputer to OpenAI in 2016.
“When you meet Jensen Huang, even with dozens of other graphics companies, you realise this is a guy you want to do business with,” said Tench Coxe, an Nvidia board member and early investor.
Industry Impact
Known for his trademark black leather jacket, Huang was frequently compared to tech icons; Mark Zuckerberg famously described him as “Taylor Swift, but for tech.” His management style was notably hands-on; he famously eschewed one-on-one meetings, preferring to address 60 direct reports simultaneously to ensure information transparency.
His advice to aspiring entrepreneurs at a Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research summit was characteristically blunt: “I wish upon you ample doses of pain and suffering.”
Following the news of his resignation, prominent industry figures reacted to the vacuum left by his departure. Elon Musk said it would be “an honour” to work with Huang.
Tim Sweeney, boss of Epic Games, praised Huang for building a company that achieved massive scale while driving continued innovation. As the company prepares to report its third-quarter fiscal 2027 results on November 17, the industry is left to wonder what happens next for the firm without its longtime leader.
Earlier coverage: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Admits to Affair as Board Investigates