Nvidia scrambles to replace CEO Jensen Huang after bombshell affair here are the possible successors

Nvidia’s board is scrambling to find a successor for ousted CEO Jensen Huang after his bombshell affair with an alleged Chinese spy — as investors fear that the tech visionary who founded the company 33 years ago is a nearly irreplaceable boss. Possible successors could on the one hand include internal execs like Colette Kress or, alternatively CEOs at rival chipmaking giants like AMD’s Lisa Su or Arm Holdings’ Rene Haas.Even former Apple CEO Tim Cook’s name has been floated by President Trump.The embattled chipmaking giant has hired an outside firm to help it hunt for both internal and external candidates, according to Bloomberg.

Kress, Nvidia’s chief financial officer and executive vice president, was named interim CEO on Thursday while the board conducts a search for a permanent successor.She’s been with the firm for 13 years. Firms often turn to their CFOs in times of crisis for a sense of stability, though they’re often seen as more of a stopgap than a permanent fix.

However, Kress’ financial expertise could be a plus as many investors are currently concerned over the massive costs of the AI buildout.Rene Haas, CEO of Arm Holdings, a British semiconductor firm, has also emerged as a likely contender.Arm Holdings had been collaborating with Nvidia on AI chips for over a decade.

In 2020, Nvidia even tried to acquire Arm in a failed $40 billion deal.Haas is also currently the CEO of SoftBank Group International, which owns Arm, a sign that he’s able to juggle several major firms, and has both engineering and management experience.He even previously worked at Nvidia for seven years. Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su is another rumored successor.

She’s been running one of Nvidia’s largest competitors for over a decade, attending many of the same conferences and White House dinners as Huang.However, AMD is still just a fraction of Nvidia’s size, with a roughly $950 billion market value compared to Nvidia’s $4 trillion. The panic ...