Nvidia’s Chief Financial Officer, Colette Kress, is set to take over as interim chief executive officer of the chipmaker following the removal of co-founder Jensen Huang, placing one of the company’s longest-serving executives at the helm of the world’s leading artificial intelligence chipmaker.
The appointment, announced on Thursday, November 12, 2026, comes amid reports of two alleged extramarital affairs involving Huang, including one with a woman alleged to be a Chinese spy.
Kress, who joined Nvidia in September 2013, has served as its executive vice president and chief financial officer for more than 13 years. Her new position puts her in charge of a company whose graphics processing units (GPUs) have become essential to the development of advanced artificial intelligence systems, supercomputers and large-scale data centres.
Although she has largely operated behind the scenes compared with Huang, Kress has played a central role in managing Nvidia’s finances during its transformation from a major graphics chip manufacturer into a dominant supplier of AI computing infrastructure.
When she joined the company in 2013, Nvidia’s annual revenue stood at $4.13bn. By fiscal 2026, that figure had risen to $215.9bn, reflecting the company’s extraordinary growth as demand for processors used in artificial intelligence systems surged.
As CFO, Kress has overseen Nvidia’s financial strategy and regularly appeared alongside Huang during quarterly earnings calls, where she discussed revenue, profitability, business performance and financial projections.
Her experience managing the company’s finances gives her an extensive understanding of its operations at a time when investors and the technology industry will be watching how it handles the leadership transition.
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Before joining Nvidia, Kress built a career spanning several major technology companies, including Texas Instruments, Microsoft and Cisco.
She spent eight years in finance roles at Texas Instruments before joining Microsoft in 1997. During her 13 years at the company, she rose through the finance organisation and became chief financial officer of its Server and Tools division in 2006.
In that role, she was responsible for financial strategy, planning and reporting for Microsoft’s server and enterprise technology business.
Kress left Microsoft in 2010 to join Cisco as senior vice president and chief financial officer of its Business Technology and Operations Finance organisation, where she handled financial strategy and business development.
She remained at Cisco until September 2013, when she moved to Nvidia to take up the position of executive vice president and CFO.
Kress holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Finance from the University of Arizona and a Master of Business Administration degree from Southern Methodist University.
By the time she joined Nvidia, she had accumulated nearly 25 years of experience in finance roles at major technology companies, according to a 2024 Fortune profile.
She told Fortune that Nvidia was the smallest company she had worked for when she joined in 2013, before its rapid expansion transformed it into a global technology powerhouse.
Nvidia’s executive officers, including Kress, are employed at will and do not have individual employment, severance or change-in-control agreements, according to the company’s proxy statement. The company has previously noted that many of its competitors offer such arrangements to senior executives.
Regulatory filings show that Kress’s compensation includes restricted stock units, which give executives company shares subject to vesting conditions. A stock award granted in March 2026 is scheduled to vest over four years.
Kress is also among America’s wealthiest self-made women. Forbes ranked her 32nd on its 2026 list, with her Nvidia shares valued at approximately $750m as of Wednesday’s market close.
That valuation had fallen from more than $1bn when Nvidia’s stock reached its peak the previous month, reflecting changes in the company’s share price.
As interim CEO, Kress faces the challenge of overseeing Nvidia through a major leadership transition while maintaining investor confidence and the company’s position in the increasingly competitive global artificial intelligence industry.
About the Author
Cecilia Attah is a tech analyst with a degree from Benue State University. She covers tech news and startups at TechRegard with a focus on how technology is transforming Africa and shaping the global landscape.
