Nvidia board probes CEO Huang's ties to suspected Chinese spy
Jensen Huang admitted an affair with Megaspeed's Alice Huang, whom US officials link to Chinese intelligence, and House chairs want a briefing on November 18.
Summary
In brief
- Nvidia's board named independent directors and outside counsel to run the inquiry
- Jensen Huang admitted the affair in a November 8 memo and said he will cooperate fully
- House committee chairs asked Huang to brief them in a closed session on November 18
Nvidia's board said in a statement on November 8 that it was opening an independent investigation into reports that CEO Jensen Huang was the target of a foreign intelligence effort, as Huang admitted an affair.
The inquiry reaches the founder of a company whose chips sit at the center of US export controls on China. Nvidia was worth about $4.5 trillion, almost 12% of the Nasdaq 100 index, and Huang holds no dual-class shares, stock that gives founders extra votes, to shield him from his board, according to a Semafor analysis.
The woman is Alice Huang, an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore-based company that builds data centers in Southeast Asia and buys Nvidia chips. US officials had determined she was working for Chinese intelligence, according to The New York Times. She is not related to the Nvidia CEO, and the US has suspected Megaspeed of helping Chinese companies obtain restricted Nvidia chips, which the company has denied.
Huang did not name the woman in his memo to employees.
I was unfaithful to my wife. My actions hurt her and our children. There is no excuse for what I did. I am deeply sorry.
— Jensen Huang, Nvidia CEO, in a memo to employees
He wrote that he supported the board's investigation and would “cooperate fully.” The board said a committee of independent directors, assisted by outside counsel, would oversee the inquiry, and that it had “no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised.”
“Jensen is committed to continuing to lead NVIDIA as CEO without interruption,” a company spokesperson told Semafor. President Donald Trump told reporters on November 8, “I haven't heard that he's done anything wrong,” and said he would take Huang on an Asia trip, Axios reported.
Democrats have been sharper. Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware wrote in a post on X on November 7 that “Congress will investigate and get answers.”
Nvidia had earlier described Huang's interactions with Alice Huang as “not unusual” and said it does not share classified information with customers, TechCrunch reported. The New York Times reported in late October that Trump had been briefed on the relationship, and in a November 8 report that Secretary of State Marco Rubio drafted a memo warning top officials about it last spring. Huang joined Trump's trip to Beijing in May.
Three House Republican chairmen, Brian Mast, John Moolenaar, and Rick Crawford, asked Huang in a November 5 letter for a closed-door briefing on his interactions with Alice Huang and on Nvidia's protections against espionage.
The chairmen asked Huang to accept the November 18 briefing date or propose another by November 11, and Nvidia reports third-quarter earnings on November 17.