Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to step down amid cheating scandal, in big blow to AI boom

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Huang's exit plunges the $4 trillion company into uncertainty and threatens to disrupt an AI ecosystem that he helped bankroll by pouring Nvidia's swelling cash pile back into cloud providers

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang is stepping down, leaving the AI industry without its biggest champion and clouding the future of the chipmaker he built into an AI powerhouse.

Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress will take over as interim CEO as Nvidia looks for a permanent successor, the company said on Thursday. Huang, who co-founded Nvidia and is its fourth-largest investor with a stake of about 3.61 per cent, will not remain on the board.

Pressure has been mounting on Huang in recent days after reports said the 63-year-old, who is married, had an affair with a Chinese businesswoman who US authorities suspect of spying for Beijing.

Nvidia's board met on Wednesday to consider his ouster, a person familiar with the matter said, after reports earlier in the day that Huang also had an extramarital affair with a senior company executive who reported to him.

Huang's exit plunges the $4 trillion company into uncertainty and threatens to disrupt an AI ecosystem that he helped bankroll by pouring Nvidia's swelling cash pile back into cloud providers, suppliers and the industry's biggest labs.

Investor sentiment toward AI stocks has already been shaky as soaring cash burn and rising debt at traditionally cash-rich tech giants fuel doubts over whether the AI boom will pay off.

The departure could also have far-reaching consequences for US chip export policy, given Huang's push to preserve access to the Chinese market and his close ties with US President Donald Trump.

Trump said on Sunday that Huang had "done an amazing job for our country" and that the Nvidia chief had told him he had no idea the Chinese woman he had an affair with was a spy.

For years, Nvidia was best known to gamers chasing top-tier graphics. But its chips' ability to perform many calculations at once has made them the oil of the AI boom and a strategic prize in the US-China race to dominate the technology. It also made Nvidia the world's most valuable company.

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