NVIDIA's board of directors announced on Thursday, Nov. 12, that Jensen Huang had resigned as the company's president and chief executive, and as a member of its board, effective immediately. A filing with U.S. market regulators says the board accepted his resignation, effective immediately, on Nov. 11. Huang co-founded NVIDIA in 1993 and had held all three posts since then. NVIDIA makes GPUs, also known as advanced AI chips. They are the hardware AI models are trained and run on.
Colette Kress, NVIDIA's chief financial officer since 2013, has agreed to serve as interim chief executive, running the company until the board names a permanent one. She will keep her finance job at the same time. The board says it is starting a search for a permanent chief executive and will consider candidates from inside and outside NVIDIA. Before NVIDIA, Kress spent nearly 25 years in finance jobs at technology companies, including Cisco and Microsoft.
The board also named Harvey C. Jones, an NVIDIA director since 1993 and a former chief executive and executive chairman of Synopsys, as its first-ever chair, the director who leads the board. Jones said the board expects NVIDIA's operations, customer commitments and product plans to continue without interruption. NVIDIA says it will still report its quarterly results on Tuesday, Nov. 17, as planned. NVIDIA's shares had fallen more than 11% in the days up to Nov. 12, according to a news report.
The announcement gives no reason for Huang's departure, and the board thanks him for his "immeasurable contributions to the company and the industry." The announcement came four days after the board opened an independent investigation into news reports that Huang had been the target of a foreign intelligence effort. At the time, the board said it had no reason to believe national security or NVIDIA secrets had been compromised, and that it had confidence in Huang. On the same day, Nov. 8, Huang wrote to employees that he had been unfaithful to his wife, and told colleagues, the board, partners and shareholders that they "deserve better from me."
According to news reports, U.S. intelligence suspected that Alice Huang, a businesswoman Jensen Huang had a romantic relationship with, was a source for China's spy service, though her exact role is unclear. She is not related to him, and he has denied knowing of any such ties, according to the reports. On Nov. 11, it was also reported that he had had a relationship with an NVIDIA executive who reported to him.
The board has not said whether its investigation, carried out by former acting U.S. Attorney Joon H. Kim, found anything, or whether it goes on now that Huang has left. The chairmen of three U.S. House committees, on foreign affairs, China and intelligence, had asked Huang to brief them behind closed doors on Nov. 18. They wanted to hear about his contacts with Alice Huang and NVIDIA's protections against foreign spying. It is not clear whether that meeting will still happen.