Nvidia's Asian supply chain prepares for life after Jensen Huang

Detailed summary

Any setback for Huang could deprive the AI industry of one of its most vocal champions. | World News

US chip giant Nvidia's partners and suppliers across Asia, from memory chip powerhouse South Korea to advanced chipmaking hub Taiwan, are redrawing plans in case Chief Executive Jensen Huang is ousted over reports of two extramarital affairs.

Nvidia's board is meeting late on Wednesday to decide on Huang's future, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters, in a sharp shift of tactics from Sunday, when the board expressed confidence in Huang and his leadership team.

"We will support whatever capacity Nvidia needs, but the new CEO may not be as aggressive as Jensen," said an executive at a Taiwan supplier who feared his company's expansion could slow if a successor was not as quick to tie up manufacturing capacity.

The executive sought anonymity because the subject is a sensitive one.

Huang has never anointed a successor, but analysts and investors see two candidates as particularly likely, at least for the short term: Nvidia's uber-engineer Ian Buck and Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress.

Any setback for Huang could deprive the AI industry of one of its most vocal champions.

His long-term strategy and direction have turned the chip giant's swelling cash pile into a war chest to fund companies ranging from AI cloud-computing providers and suppliers to the biggest labs.

"Without him at the helm, we will likely see a slowdown in new, aggressive ecosystem-level investments and lucrative bilateral AI infrastructure deals from NVIDIA side," said Neil Shah, vice president of research at Counterpoint Research.

Also Read | Nvidia preparing to remove CEO Jensen Huang amid affair probe: Report

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