In a stunning shake-up at the world's most valuable chipmaker, Nvidia announced Thursday that co-founder Jensen Huang has stepped down from his positions as president, chief executive officer, and board director, effective immediately. The departure followed an emergency late-night board session on Wednesday, with chief financial officer Colette Kress tapped to lead the company on an interim basis. The board said it will evaluate both internal and external candidates in its search for a permanent successor.
New interim Nvidia CEO Colette Kress
Huang's abrupt exit caps a turbulent week dominated by reports of two extramarital relationships. The New York Times first revealed that Huang had been involved with Alice Huang (no relation), an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore-based cloud provider that ranks among Nvidia's major customers. According to the report, U.S. intelligence officials suspect she may have been recruited by China's Ministry of State Security to collect information on advanced AI chips. Huang acknowledged being "unfaithful" to his wife in a weekend memo sent to employees. Days later, on Wednesday, the Times — citing people who worked at Nvidia — reported a second relationship, this one with Kimberly Powell, Nvidia's vice president of healthcare, who reported directly to Huang.
Jensen Huang
Notably, just earlier this week, Nvidia's board had publicly backed Huang, announcing it had launched an independent investigation into the intelligence-related claims while stressing it had no reason to believe national security or company secrets had been compromised. The board said at the time that it retained confidence in its longtime leader.
Thursday's official statement makes no mention of the alleged affairs. Instead, it expresses gratitude for Huang's "immeasurable contributions" over his 33 years at the company he co-founded. Nvidia also announced the appointment of Harvey C. Jones, the former CEO and executive chairman of Synopsys, as the first independent chair of the board in company history. Jones said the board has full confidence in Kress and the broader leadership team, and that he expects operations, customer commitments, and the product roadmap to proceed without disruption.
Investors reacted swiftly to the news, sending Nvidia shares down roughly 10% in premarket trading on Thursday. The company is still slated to deliver its latest quarterly earnings report on Tuesday, an event that will now draw even greater scrutiny from Wall Street.
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