NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang Resigns, CFO Appointed Interim CEO — Who Is Kress?
Original | Odaily (@OdailyChina)
Author | jk
On the evening of November 12, NVIDIA announced that co-founder Jensen Huang has resigned from his roles as President, Chief Executive Officer, and member of the Board of Directors, effective immediately. The 63-year-old founder, who had led the company for 33 years, ultimately departed in disgrace after days of escalating fallout from an extramarital affair scandal.
The company stated in its announcement that the Board of Directors has accepted the resignation. According to the 8-K filing NVIDIA submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the resignation was accepted by the Board on November 11. Huang has also exited the Board of Directors and no longer retains any board seat.
Huang co-founded NVIDIA in 1993, building a graphics chip company into a core supplier at the heart of the AI wave, with the company's market capitalization once reaching approximately $4 trillion. He currently holds about 3.6% of NVIDIA's shares, making him the company's fourth-largest shareholder.
Personnel Arrangements: CFO Takes Over as Interim CEO
NVIDIA has appointed Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress as interim CEO until the Board selects a permanent successor. Kress will continue to serve as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer while assuming the CEO duties on an acting basis.
Colette Kress
At the board level, Harvey C. Jones, former CEO of Synopsys and a director since 1993, has been appointed as the company's first Chairman of the Board. Previously, NVIDIA had no independent board chair; Huang held the CEO role and occupied a board seat simultaneously.
The Board will conduct a search for a permanent CEO both internally and externally. In a statement, Jones said the Board has full confidence in Kress and the management team and expects that company operations, customer commitments, and the product roadmap will not be affected. Kress also stated that she will continue to advance the company's work on the foundation built by Huang.
New CEO's Background: 13 Years at the Company, Net Worth of $1 Billion
Colette Kress, born in 1967 in the United States and now approximately 59 years old, has long served as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of NVIDIA. With this interim CEO appointment, she becomes the first woman to lead NVIDIA in its history.
Kress has a solid academic background. She earned her bachelor's degree in finance from the University of Arizona and subsequently obtained an MBA from Southern Methodist University's Cox School of Business. These credentials laid the foundation for her nearly three-decade career in finance and management in the technology industry.
She began her career at Texas Instruments, where she worked for approximately eight years in various finance roles, gaining hands-on experience in the semiconductor industry. In 1997, she joined Microsoft, where she served for 13 years. During her time at Microsoft, she held senior positions in corporate planning and finance, and from 2006 served as CFO of the Server and Tools Division. That division was responsible for the financial strategy, planning, and reporting for enterprise products including Windows Server, SQL Server, and developer tools, and Kress was deeply involved in the financial management and resource allocation of a large software business during this period.
In 2010, Kress moved to Cisco, where she served as Senior Vice President and CFO of the Business Technology and Operations Finance organization, responsible for financial strategy, planning, reporting, and business development across business units, engineering, and operations.
In September 2013, recruited personally by Jensen Huang, she joined NVIDIA as Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. At the time, NVIDIA's annual revenue was only about $4.13 billion (fiscal year 2014), making it the smallest company of her career. She has said that her two sons were familiar with NVIDIA because of gaming graphics cards, which influenced her decision to join to some extent. Huang described to her at a whiteboard his vision of the company becoming a supplier of artificial intelligence computing infrastructure—a strategic direction that later proved highly prescient.
During Kress's 13-year tenure, NVIDIA completed a profound transformation from a gaming graphics card manufacturer to a global leader in artificial intelligence and accelerated computing. Company revenue soared from $4.13 billion in fiscal year 2014 to $215.9 billion in fiscal year 2026, a roughly 52-fold increase; market capitalization once surpassed several trillion dollars, making it one of the most valuable technology companies in the world. She and Huang long appeared together on quarterly earnings calls, explaining performance, outlook, and capital allocation to investors with a steady, meticulous, data-driven style, earning deep trust on Wall Street. Analysts widely regard her not only as a financial leader but as someone with the vision and influence of a chief operating officer, and as one of the most respected executives within the company.
In her specific work, Kress led the digital transformation of NVIDIA's finance function, driving the automation and digitization of manual processes; participated in multiple strategic investments the company made in other technology enterprises; and helped customers address supporting needs such as data center space, advancing NVIDIA's deep positioning within the AI ecosystem. She has publicly commented on OpenAI-related investments and demonstrated prudent financial judgment in key decisions. For example, she proposed adjustments to large-scale customer financing arrangements to balance growth with investor expectations. In July 2025, thanks to her NVIDIA stock holdings, she became a billionaire with a net worth of approximately $1 billion to $1.2 billion, making her one of the few technology executives to join the billionaire ranks by virtue of a CFO position.
In terms of honors, she received the Silicon Valley Business Journal's CFO of the Year award in 2016; was multiple times included in Forbes' Most Powerful Women list and Fortune's Most Powerful Women list (ranking 49th in 2026); received the Chief organization's "The New Era in Business" award in 2024; and was included in the MarketWatch 50 as a key figure in AI. These recognitions reflect her central role in driving NVIDIA's financial health and strategic expansion.
NVIDIA Stock Hits 5-Month Low
NVIDIA's stock price fell sharply after the resignation announcement. After The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that the Board was preparing to force Huang out, NVIDIA shares had already dropped more than 9% in after-hours trading; at tonight's U.S. market open, NVIDIA's stock continued to decline, briefly falling below $150, hitting a new low since June 15 of this year, before the decline narrowed to trade at $160 at the time of writing.
Dan Ives, Partner and Senior Managing Director at Yorkville Ives, said in an investor note on Sunday that the investigation represents a blemish for Huang, could trigger multiple congressional investigations, and that Huang faces the risk of being removed, which would put pressure on the stock price.
NVIDIA said the Board has full confidence in Kress and the management team and expects no disruption to company operations, customer commitments, or the product roadmap.
Extramarital Affair Exposed, a Dismal Exit
Huang's departure stems from two reports of extramarital affairs.
On November 8 (Sunday), Huang sent an email to employees acknowledging his infidelity to his wife and apologizing to employees, the Board, and shareholders. NVIDIA's Board announced the same day that a committee of independent directors, with the assistance of outside independent counsel, would conduct an investigation. The Board stated there was no reason to believe that company secrets had been leaked.
On November 11 (Wednesday), The New York Times reported that Huang had a romantic relationship with Kimberly Powell, NVIDIA's Vice President of Healthcare; both are married, and Powell reports to Huang. The report said the two were photographed in an intimate encounter at a hotel in San Jose, California, in March of this year.
The Wall Street Journal subsequently reported that the Board was preparing to force Huang out. CBS cited sources as saying the Trump administration was aware of the matter. CNBC confirmed that the Board met that evening to discuss whether to remove Huang, with the meeting continuing late into the night. The following day, NVIDIA announced Huang's resignation.
