Nvidia’s Jensen Huang: prophet of the AI age
Jensen Huang’s Nvidia started out in computer games. That may have been merely a toehold on the route to global dominance in the tech industry.
In 1993, Jensen Huang quit a well-paid position as a Silicon Valley chip designer to launch a videogames venture with two friends. They called it Nvidia – a play on the Latin word for “envy”. At the time, “many people thought he was mad”, says The Times, and he struggled to raise seed capital. But nearly 30 years on, Huang is presiding over the largest and most valuable semiconductor company in the world and hailed as one of tech’s great visionaries. “Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk – I put Jensen in that group,” says one admirer.
Sprinkled with 21st-century gold dust
With hindsight, Nvidia’s early focus on games seems “an unconventional path” to global dominance, says the Financial Times. But Huang’s great breakthrough was the realisation that the data-intensive chips needed to create imaginary gaming worlds could be put to more scientific uses. The sector then was “a zero billion-dollar market”, he tells Forbes. But “we postulated” that this new industry, with its “rich and beautiful” 3D graphics, was going to be one of the largest in tech. After floating in 1999, Nvidia evolved from making PC graphics cards to graphics processors (GPUs) before taking the major leap into programming GPUs for more general-purpose tasks in 2007. Its chips have since become “the main engines for training the neural networks at the heart of artificial intelligence [AI]” – in other words, 21st-century gold dust. Nvidia’s shares have leaped tenfold since 2016.
Huang, 58, cuts a somewhat flamboyant figure, habitually adding a leather jacket to the all-black Silicon Valley uniform, and sporting a prominent tattoo based on Nvidia’s logo at the top of one arm, says Fortune. He had it done to mark the stock hitting $100 and claims to have cried “like a baby” from the pain.
Subscribe to MoneyWeek
Subscribe to MoneyWeek today and get your first six magazine issues absolutely FREE
Sign up to Money Morning
Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter
Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter
Born in 1963 in Taiwan, Huang moved to the US a decade later and grew up in Oregon. His education – at a Baptist boarding school in rural Kentucky – was somewhat unusual, and duties included cleaning the bathrooms daily for a dorm of 150 boys. But he describes it as a formative experience, adding that he “loved every minute”. A trained electrical engineer – he studied first at Oregon State and then Stanford – Huang has always combined his talents with technology with a “ruthless focus on execution”, Adobe chief executive Shantanu Narayen told Fortune. He’s not the sort of visionary who talks “about going to Mars or something”, observes an early Nvidia backer. “His vision is out five to ten years.” He’s widely admired for positioning his company to take advantage of blossoming trends: for understanding “where the puck is going”.
Of late, Huang’s puck has been whirling around the Cambridge HQ of Arm, the UK chip champion he hopes to buy from Japan’s SoftBank for about $40bn – assuming the UK government, which is examining the deal on national-security grounds, allows the deal to go head. Huang reckons that acquiring the chipmaker at the heart of most smart devices globally will be a transformative move – hastening his vision to unleash “the modern Big Bang”.
Unsurprisingly, the rest of the industry has misgivings about such a stranglehold of power. Moreover, the US-China trade war, and the current acute shortage of chips, have rammed home, even to the most technically illiterate, the strategic importance of semiconductors. Huang may go down in history as one of the great prophets of the AI age. Unfortunately for him, perhaps, the rest of the world has cottoned on.
Jane writes profiles for MoneyWeek and is city editor of The Week. A former British Society of Magazine Editors editor of the year, she cut her teeth in journalism editing The Daily Telegraph’s Letters page and writing gossip for the London Evening Standard – while contributing to a kaleidoscopic range of business magazines including Personnel Today, Edge, Microscope, Computing, PC Business World, and Business & Finance.
She has edited corporate publications for accountants BDO, business psychologists YSC Consulting, and the law firm Stephenson Harwood – also enjoying a stint as a researcher for the due diligence department of a global risk advisory firm.
Her sole book to date, Stay or Go? (2016), rehearsed the arguments on both sides of the EU referendum.
She lives in north London, has a degree in modern history from Trinity College, Oxford, and is currently learning to play the drums.
-
Private school fees soar and VAT threat looms – what does it mean for you?
Rising private school fees could see more than one in five parents pull their children out of their current school. Before you remortgage, move house or look to grandparents for help, here’s what you need to know.
By Katie Williams Published
-
Best and worst UK banks for online banking revealed
When it comes to keeping your money safe, not all banks are equal. We reveal the best and worst banks for online banking when it comes to protecting your money from scams
By Oojal Dhanjal Published
-
Should your business invest in a VoIP phone service?
Here's what you need to know about VOIP (voice over IP) services before landlines go digital in 2025.
By David Prosser Published
-
The end of China’s boom
Like the US, China too got fat on fake money. Now, China's doom is not far away.
By Bill Bonner Published
-
The many frauds of Dozy Mmobuosi, failed Sheffield United owner
Profile Dozy Mmobuosi was a big-hitter with a fintech empire when he stepped in to rescue a failing Yorkshire football club. But he was not quite the saviour he seemed.
By Jane Lewis Published
-
What is the future of Royal Mail in the UK?
With fewer of us sending letters and parcels, the Royal Mail is finding dealing with the nation’s post is an increasingly unprofitable and costly business.
By Simon Wilson Published
-
What's the secret of Manolo Blahnik's success?
Fashion maestro Manolo Blahnik shows little sign of slowing down at 81, and his company notched up a record financial year in 2022. What is the secret of his success?
By Jane Lewis Published
-
Michelle Mone's "tough year of pain"
Michelle Mone liked to portray herself as a working-class heroine who worked her way to the top through grit and determination. But her pedestal is built on sand.
By Jane Lewis Published
-
Trevor Milton, the Elon Musk wannabe, is jailed for fraud
The former CEO of Nikola, Trevor Milton, has been found guilty of lying about the development of the company's electric trucks.
By Jane Lewis Published
-
Directors should think twice before waiving limited liability
Should small-business directors ever provide a personal guarantee in return for bank finance?
By David Prosser Published