NVIDIA’s co-founder and former CEO, Jensen Huang. (Photograph: NVIDIA.)
NASDAQ-listed NVIDIA has announced that Jensen Huang has resigned his positions as president, CEO and a board member with immediate effect following allegations that he was not only in a relationship with an NVIDIA executive but also with a woman who is said to be a Chinese spy.
In a statement issued late this afternoon, the chipmaker said CFO and executive VP Colette Kress would serve as interim CEO in addition to her other roles until a permanent successor has been named.
The board will consider internal and external candidates for the CEO role, says the company, which became the first listed company to be worth more than $5 trillion in October 2025.
Its shares had slid 7.76% at the time of writing, dropping its value to $3.87 trillion.
“Colette has helped lead NVIDIA through a period of extraordinary growth and has a deep understanding of our business, customers, operations and financial position,” says chairman Harvey Jones.
Jones adds: “She is supported by an experienced leadership team that has been instrumental in executing NVIDIA’s strategy and advancing its technology roadmap. The board has full confidence in Colette and the leadership team, and we expect the company’s operations, customer commitments and product roadmap to continue without interruption.”
“NVIDIA’s strength has always come from its people, and together with our leadership team, I am committed to building on the extraordinary foundation Jensen [Huang] created over the last 33 years,” says Kress.
Kress adds that “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.”
In this afternoon’s statement, NVIDIA’s board and the company thanked Huang, who had been at the helm of the computer chip company for more than three decades, for his “immeasurable contributions to the company and the industry”.
The NASDAQ-listed company did not comment on the allegations although it noted that Huang’s contributions “are profound” adding that it is “one of the most consequential technology companies in the world”.
Towards the end of October, The New York Times reported that the US federal government believed Huang had a close relationship with Alice Huang, who worked for Singapore-based NVIDIA customer Megaspeed. She was allegedly recruited by China’s Ministry of State Security as a spy.
Media reports indicate that the CEO admitted to marital infidelity with Alice – who is no relation – in an internal memo to employees on 8 November. Huang is married to Lori (née Mills) who he met at Oregon State University and they have two children.
Following his admission of the affair, NVIDIA’s board launched an investigation and subsequently said it had no reason to believe national security or company secrets had been compromised, adding that it had confidence in Huang and his leadership team, according to reports at the time.
On 11 November, The New York Times reported a second alleged affair, this time with NVIDIA vice-president of healthcare Kimberly Powell, who reports to Huang. The pair were allegedly filmed being affectionate at a hotel during a company conference, potentially breaching Nvidia’s code of conduct on relationships that create conflicts of interest.
Huang was one of the founding members of NVIDIA in the early 1990s, with the three founders – Huang, engineer Chris Malachowsky and technical designer Curtis Priem – putting an initial total of $600 into the company.
The former CEO was 30 when the company was incorporated in 1993 from a Denny’s restaurant in San Jose, California, according to Wikipedia. The online encyclopaedia notes that he led the company out of near-bankruptcy during the 1990s and oversaw its expansion from GPU development into high-performance computing and artificial intelligence (AI).
The 63-year-old Huang is currently ranked 13th on Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index with a $145 billion fortune, although the index does not yet seem to have taken into account the stock rout.
*The US dollar was worth R16.77 at the time of writing.
