Wall Street is already speculating about who could take the permanent CEO role at Nvidia (NVDA) following Jensen Huang’s abrupt departure, with CFO Colette Kress serving as interim CEO.
Here’s the list of names that have come up so far:
Rene Haas, Arm Holdings CEO
ARM (ARM) CEO Rene Haas is a potential successor to Jensen Huang as Nvidia CEO, according to the Financial Times.
Haas has been the leader of Arm since 2022. He became vice president and general manager of Nvidia’s Computing Products Business Unit in October 2006 and left Nvidia for Arm in October 2013.
“He ran a business unit there and reported right into Jensen and knows him well,” Patrick Moorhead, founder of Moor Insights and Strategy, told Yahoo Finance on Thursday.
“Rene has really done a great job in shepherding the company into where it is today,” Unconventional AI CEO Naveen Rao said on Deirdre Bosa Live on Friday. “He’s done great inside of Arm. I think Arm is a very different company from Nvidia.”
“You need someone who really has that product vision, understands the technical details,” Rao added.
Ian Buck, Nvidia vice president of hyperscale and high-performance computing
Wall Street strategists have also floated Nvidia insider Ian Buck’s name as the company’s next leader. Prediction markets Kalshi and Polymarket have zeroed in on the exec, with both sites ranking the odds of Buck taking over at roughly 40%.
Buck has worked at Nvidia for the last 22 years, rising from a systems engineer to his current role as the head of the company’s biggest businesses.
The executive also has the kind of engineering chops that Nvidia’s board may find compelling for the CEO role.
“He is the father of CUDA, and he runs the hyperscaler business at Nvidia, which is the lion’s share of their revenue and profit dollars, and externally,” Moorhead said.
Chris Malachowsky, Nvidia co-founder
Nvidia co-founder Chris Malachowsky could also step in to serve as CEO. An accomplished engineer with nearly 40 patents to his name, Malachowsky is an Nvidia fellow and senior technology executive, according to a company biography,
Malachowsky has overseen efforts within Nvidia, including its operations and engineering. He’s also led its research organization.
Tim Cook, former Apple CEO
Shortly after Nvidia’s board announced Huang’s immediate resignation, President Trump floated that former Apple (AAPL) CEO Tim Cook would be the best person for the top job at the AI chip giant.
“NOW THAT Nvidia CEO JENSEN HUANG, who has done a fantastic job, has resigned, there is only one man to take his place – TIM COOK of Apple. A Legend replaces a Legend!” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday.
On Friday, Polymarket bettors placed a 5% chance that Cook would be selected.
Yorkville’s Dan Ives said Cook would be “a dark horse candidate in our view, given the global importance of Nvidia to the overall US tech industry.”
Source: finance.yahoo.com
