Open letter demands Nvidia’s board bring back Jensen Huang
More than 150,000 people, including Elon Musk, have signed an open letter calling on Nvidia’s board to reinstate Jensen Huang as CEO. According to the campaign, more than 7,500 of them are current Nvidia employees, but the signatures cannot be verified.
The letter is published by a campaign called Stand with Jensen. The campaign describes itself as an independent initiative by current and former Nvidia employees, partners and shareholders, and says it is not endorsed by Nvidia or by Huang. The organisers are not named.
The letter asks the board to reinstate Huang while an independent investigation establishes the facts, unless it can show that his departure is in Nvidia’s best interests. They also want the board to disclose the scope, independence and expected timeline of the investigation, give Huang a chance to respond before a final decision, and publicly explain its concerns and the evidence behind them. According to the letter, those behind it have not been shown any evidence that the woman Huang had a relationship with was working for a foreign intelligence service, and they fear he was removed without due process.
“Suspicion or association alone is not a sufficient basis for ending Jensen’s leadership,” the letter reads.
Nvidia’s own account is brief. On 12 November, the company announced that Huang had resigned as president, CEO and board member, effective immediately, without giving a reason. CFO Colette Kress was appointed interim CEO. The announcement came a few days after the board launched an independent investigation following reports that Huang had been the target of a foreign intelligence effort. At the time, the board said it had no reason to believe that national security or Nvidia’s trade secrets had been compromised, and that it had confidence in Huang. The resignation announcement did not mention the investigation.
As of Sunday evening, the campaign’s website listed more than 150,00 signatures. Of these, more than 7,500 were registered as current Nvidia employees, 1,400 as former employees and more than 80,000 as shareholders. The campaign estimates that about 18% of Nvidia’s roughly 42,000 staff have signed the letter. Affiliations and titles are self-reported, and the site itself states that they are not verified.
Musk confirmed on X on 13 November that he was signing the letter. The list also includes other well-known names from the tech industry, such as Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney and YouTube co-founder Steve Chen. A day later, Musk also commented on Huang’s departure, pointing to the deals Huang made with suppliers.
“Jensen drove supply chain brilliantly at Nvidia, but many of those deals were a handshake with Jensen, not a written contract. Without Jensen, at least some of those critical deals will be lost,” Musk wrote on 14 November.
Nvidia has not commented on the letter. The company reports its third-quarter results on 17 November, its first since Huang’s departure.
