Outside Speculation Names Lisa Su and Rene Haas as Nvidia CEO Options

Outside speculation has put Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) Chair and CEO Lisa Su and Arm CEO Rene Haas forward as hypothetical options for Nvidia’s top job while Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang faces scrutiny.

The two executives bring different backgrounds to the discussion: Su leads a company that competes directly with Nvidia, while Haas previously worked at Nvidia before taking the top job at Arm.

Huang co-founded Nvidia in 1993 and has led it for more than 33 years. More than 60 senior executives report directly to him, and the company has no clearly identified second-in-command. Possible internal successors raised in the discussion include Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress and Nvidia Vice President Ian Buck, who has long worked on its GPU-computing technology.

Su has led AMD since 2014, overseeing its expansion from PC processors into server CPUs, data-center GPUs and AI accelerators. AMD competes with Nvidia in GPUs, AI accelerators and data-center computing. Su and Huang are distant relatives, a connection that adds complexity to the hypothetical prospect of her moving to Nvidia.

Haas became Arm’s CEO in 2022 after working at Nvidia for about seven years. Arm’s CPU architecture is used in smartphones, data centers and AI devices. His experience at Nvidia and leadership of Arm give him a different profile from Su, who leads one of Nvidia’s direct competitors.

The succession discussion comes as the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) investigates whether Huang was targeted by a foreign intelligence operation. Nvidia’s independent directors have hired former federal prosecutor Joon Kim to lead an internal review.

Nvidia has said it has no reason to believe U.S. national security or company trade secrets were compromised. Huang has pledged to cooperate with the review.