Huang was widely expected to weather the storm after the first romance became public, even as Nvidia announced it had launched an investigation to determine whether its CEO had been “the target of a foreign intelligence effort.” A current Nvidia staff member told the BBC that initial reports of his infidelity were more or less ignored by rank-and-file workers within the company. It wasn’t until Huang’s alleged affair with the Nvidia executive became public that workers began to feel “this is crazy,” the person said. Another Nvidia employee said they had been told not to speak to the press or discuss the situation publicly. Many employees have earned millions of dollars in compensation thanks to their ability to cash out their Nvidia shares as the stock soared. An independent investigation would examine all available information. The company’s meteoric rise had been led by Jensen Huang, who became a major driver of the artificial intelligence industry, which depends on Nvidia for the powerful computer chips it makes. Initially, those chips were designed for computer games. But as AI technology evolved over the past four years toward chatbots and large language models, companies making AI tools suddenly needed large quantities of Nvidia computer chips that could process large amounts of data. Nvidia is now looking for a permanent replacement for Huang. Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress was named interim CEO Thursday. Several tech experts the BBC spoke to this week noted that Huang’s downfall has been a major topic of conversation in circles in the San Francisco Bay area, an area filled with tech employees, industry executives and billionaires. Huang has been married to Lori Huang for 40 years. His children are also Nvidia executives. Nvidia’s stock drop this week is the most significant five-day drop the company has seen since going public 27 years ago. Its market value has increased more than 470% in the last five years, peaking just a few weeks ago. Now it is down 31% in a context of greater uncertainty in the technology sector.
