Nvidia’s board needs to do some succession planning – sharpish

The chipmaker faces business risks and political scrutiny due to its over-reliance on founder and CEO Jensen Huang

Why is Nvidia’s Jensen Huang at the centre of a US-China row?

Too big – and too well-connected – to sack? One doesn’t have to be overly cynical to think Jensen Huang, the Nvidia boss, starts with one huge advantage as the chipmaker’s board starts its independent investigation into the alleged honeytrap spy scandal. The world of US big tech is not, to put it mildly, strong on checks and balances on a founder’s power.

Huang does not enjoy the supercharged voting rights that are par for the course elsewhere – his shareholding is a plain vanilla 3.6%. On the other hand, Nvidia’s board does not appear to have spent much time worrying about succession planning and “key person risk” or other standard concerns of corporate governance wonks outside the US.

There isn’t even a Nvidia board member with the title of chair. Instead, a “lead director” is “designated annually by a majority of the independent directors”, which sounds like a formula for ensuring the attention remains wholly focused on Huang, the sole executive member.

It’s the American way, of course: the cult of the superstar founder or chief executive runs deep and there is a fair argument that such set-ups encourage adventurous risk-taking in pursuit of grand corporate visions. But such governance arrangements look unsuited to situations where the behaviour of the boss is under scrutiny and the role of the board itself is being examined.

The investigation will examine whether Huang “has been the target of a foreign intelligence effort” but the independent directors stressed there is now “no reason to believe that either national security or Nvidia secrets were compromised.”

OK, but legitimate questions don’t end there. Did Huang break Nvidia’s internal code of conduct? Did he mislead the board about his relationship with Alice Huang (no relation), the alleged Chinese spy? Was the board aware of US intelligence reports that Ms Huang had been hired by China’s ministry of state security to spy on the Nvidia boss, as reported by the New York Times? What security precautions were in place? Other boards in other countries might have insisted on suspending the boss until all the facts are in.

In the meantime, the defence of Huang from elsewhere has begun. “An honourable guy. I think he probably has an excuse for it,” said Donald Trump. “Jensen is irreplaceable for America’s AI leadership,” opined Shaun Maguire, a partner at Sequoia Capital, the powerful Silicon Valley investor. Yes, there is little doubt the US tech and political establishment would like this saga to end up in a series of bland conclusions about an everyday infidelity.

Nvidia’s board, however, would be wise not to rely on the “irreplaceable” consensus holding, or the political heat going away. This affair will be trawled over by newly empowered Democrats in Congress because it touches on how forcefully – or not – the administration has been enforcing its own national security restrictions on chip sales to China. This process will go on for months. Huang’s personal relationship with Trump will come under the spotlight like never before.

Will the Nvidia boss, even if he is cleared by the board’s investigation, still look so all-conquering by the end? His lobbying clout in Washington will be diminished. And Nvidia’s shareholders, if they’re doing the job properly, will surely insist on far greater visibility on where the company’s chips end up.

There may come a point where it is in Nvidia’s own interests to move on from the Jensen Huang era. The 63-year-old deserves all his accolades for spotting the enormous AI opportunity for the GPU chips that originated in the world of video games. The rise of Nvidia has been extraordinary. But over-reliance on one individual is also a business risk. Time for some overdue succession planning – it may be needed.