Jensen Huang resigned as president, chief executive and a member of the board of Nvidia with immediate effect on Thursday, ending 33 years at the chipmaker he co-founded, the board said. Colette Kress, the company's executive vice president and chief financial officer, will serve as interim CEO while the board searches for a permanent successor.
The announcement did not give a reason for the departure. It said Kress will keep her finance portfolio alongside the top job, and that the board will consider candidates from inside and outside the company.
Kress has been Nvidia's CFO since September 2013, after nearly 25 years in finance roles at technology companies including Cisco and Microsoft. The board also appointed Harvey C. Jones, an entrepreneur and technology executive who was chief executive and executive chairman of Synopsys, as its first-ever chair.
"Colette has helped lead NVIDIA through a period of extraordinary growth and has a deep understanding of our business, customers, operations and financial position," Jones said. "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."
Kress said the company would build on "the extraordinary foundation Jensen created over the last 33 years" and that its focus "remains on serving our customers, partners, developers and shareholders". The board thanked Huang for his "immeasurable contributions to the company and the industry".
The resignation comes four days after the board opened an independent investigation, overseen by a committee of independent directors assisted by outside counsel, into reports that Huang had been the target of a foreign intelligence effort. The board said then that it had no reason to believe that national security or Nvidia secrets had been compromised, and that it had confidence in Huang. In a message to employees the same day, Huang admitted he had been unfaithful to his wife and said he would cooperate with the review. Reports have also described a second extramarital relationship, with a company executive; Huang has not commented on that.
Nvidia shares and the wider AI trade have been under pressure through the week as the allegations against its founder mounted, with technology stocks dragging global indices.
The company, which Huang co-founded in 1993, is now one of the world's most valuable, and sits at the centre of the artificial intelligence buildout. Nvidia said it will report third-quarter fiscal 2027 results on November 17 as scheduled, with an earnings call the same day.
(Compiled from media reports with the help of our in-house AI tools, and edited by our desk)