Nvidia Approaches Arm CEO Rene Haas as Successor Candidate

Nvidia's board approached Arm Holdings chief executive Rene Haas as a potential successor to Jensen Huang, the Financial Times reported Friday, citing people familiar with the matter. Huang stepped down Thursday after revelations of extramarital affairs, including one involving a suspected Chinese spy, plunging the chipmaker into crisis and sending shockwaves across an AI industry he helped bankroll.

Haas is among several candidates being considered, according to the report. Nvidia finance chief Colette Kress is serving as interim chief executive. Arm declined to comment, while Nvidia did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Reuters said it could not independently verify the report.

Haas spent seven formative years at Nvidia, rising to vice president and general manager of its computing products business, before joining Arm in 2013. He became Arm chief executive in 2022 and oversaw the company's Nasdaq listing in 2023. Arm designs processor architectures and licenses them to other companies that develop chip designs. Historically its strength has been in mobile phones and it is expanding into computers.

Haas's name has been making the rounds among analysts since Huang's exit. Analysts have noted that Huang personally steered engineering roadmaps, geopolitical negotiations over China exports and investments across the AI ecosystem for three decades. The succession comes as Nvidia faces heightened regulatory scrutiny and growing consensus among US lawmakers to further restrict the company's chip exports to China.

Analysts view Kress as a steady financial authority, while veteran engineer Ian Buck is seen as a top candidate after leading development of CUDA, the software platform that powers Nvidia's AI chips. Apart from Haas, external names discussed by analysts include AMD chief Lisa Su, who has navigated the key China market, and Micron chief Sanjay Mehrotra, whose memory chips power Nvidia servers. Other candidates cited by industry watchers include Marvell head Matt Murphy and Apple hardware chief Johny Srouji, who oversaw the iPhone maker's in-house silicon development. Former Apple chief Tim Cook was floated by US President Donald Trump, as Nvidia's board evaluates whether to prioritize financial continuity, deep technical expertise, or experience running a global tech heavyweight.

In delayed trading, Nvidia (NVDA) shares were down 2.01% at $162.85 and Arm (ARM) shares were down 4.63% at $190.53.