Nvidia Loses Its Founder-CEO Jensen Huang After Two Affair Reports and a Security Probe

Jensen Huang has resigned as president, chief executive and board member of Nvidia, ending a 33-year tenure at the company he co-founded. The board announced the move on Thursday 12 November, the BBC reports, after reports of two extramarital relationships. Chief financial officer Colette Kress has taken over as interim CEO while the company looks for a permanent successor, according to Al Jazeera.

The BBC says Nvidia’s shares fell sharply on Wednesday after the second report, and describes the company as still valued at nearly $4 trillion. Nvidia controls an estimated 90% of the market for advanced AI chips, Al Jazeera says, and customers include Google, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft, Tesla and OpenAI, the BBC notes.

How it unfolded

On 29 October the New York Times reported that Huang had a close relationship with Alice Huang, who is no relation. She was an executive at the Singapore-based data-centre company Megaspeed between March and November 2023. US officials allege she is a Chinese intelligence asset, the BBC reports. Huang admitted to being “unfaithful” to his wife and apologised to her, his children and Nvidia’s staff.

Nvidia’s board first backed him. On Sunday it said it had confidence in his leadership and launched an independent investigation, saying his interactions with the woman were “not unusual or unexpected”. President Trump also initially backed Huang, calling him “honourable”. On Wednesday the New York Times reported a second relationship, with Kimberly Powell, a vice president of healthcare who reported directly to him. The BBC says the board met that evening. Huang resigned the next day.

The board said his contributions were “profound”. Both outlets stress what has not been shown. Al Jazeera notes there is no established evidence he knowingly assisted Beijing or that company secrets were compromised, and the board has said it has no reason to believe national security was compromised.

The first report touched a live policy fight, one that now has to proceed without its loudest corporate voice. In the BBC’s account Huang also had unusual access to power, courted by both the US and Chinese presidents. Huang spent years campaigning against restrictions on Nvidia chip sales to China, Al Jazeera reports, and Washington has approved exports of H200 chips under inspections, shipment limits and a 25% tariff. Chinese companies reportedly ordered more than two million of the chips, potentially worth $54 billion. Al Jazeera’s correspondent stresses those are orders, not completed sales.

The second report raised a governance question: a potential conflict of interest involving a senior executive who reported to the chief executive. The BBC notes Huang’s son and daughter, Spencer and Madison, and his son-in-law also hold senior roles at the company. The board has 11 directors, including Huang, and could have removed him by majority vote, but he left first.

What happens next rests on the board’s search. The BBC says possible successors discussed include co-founder Chris Malachowsky and Ian Buck, who runs high-performance computing, though neither outlet reports an official shortlist. Until a permanent chief executive is named, the world’s most important AI chip supplier is run by an interim, and its largest customers and Washington are watching who gets the job.