Nvidia's New Boss Isn't an Engineer: The CFO Now in Charge
Nvidia pulled in roughly $4.13 billion a year when Colette Kress first joined. By fiscal 2026, that number had climbed to $215.9 billion. More than fifty times bigger. The executive who managed those books now runs the whole company.
Kress is 59 and was Nvidia's chief financial officer. On Thursday the board named her interim CEO. It is the first time in 33 years that anyone besides Jensen Huang has held that job. Huang resigned abruptly. Reports about extramarital affairs came out, along with allegations involving a suspected Chinese intelligence operative. Kress keeps her CFO role while the search for a permanent chief executive goes on, according to the company's regulatory filing.
Her path to the top job was not a straight line through chip design. She spent eight years at Texas Instruments. Microsoft hired her in 1997, and she stayed 13 years, eventually serving as CFO of its Server and Tools division. In 2010 she moved to Cisco as senior vice president and CFO of its Business Technology and Operations Finance group. She earned a finance degree from the University of Arizona and later an MBA from Southern Methodist University. Nvidia hired her in September 2013, back when the company was mostly known for gaming graphics cards. Her two sons, both avid gamers, actually pushed her to take the offer. Huang recruited her personally and drew out his vision for AI computing on a whiteboard. At the time, Nvidia was the smallest company she had ever worked for.
What did she build there? She oversaw the money behind Nvidia's jump from gaming hardware into data centers and AI infrastructure. That included the $6.9 billion purchase of networking specialist Mellanox. It also included an aggressive habit of investing in companies that buy Nvidia's computing hardware. One example is CoreWeave, which received another $2 billion from Nvidia in January. Kress became the company's main financial voice on Wall Street, fielding questions about margins, chip demand and revenue forecasts on earnings calls. Forbes counted her among America's richest self-made women in 2026, crediting her with nearly $750 million in Nvidia shares as of Wednesday's close.
Serious questions are waiting for her. Investors are asking whether the boom in AI infrastructure spending can actually last. Nvidia had already shed about $1.27 trillion in market value from its October peak before the board confirmed it was investigating the allegations against Huang. The board says it sees no reason to believe company secrets or U.S. national security were compromised. Kress also has to deal with Washington's limits on advanced chip exports to China, plus scrutiny of Nvidia's business partnerships. Here is the hard part: knowing the finances is not the same as knowing the technology. Her background does not replace Huang's engineering depth or his personal ties to developers, customers and governments. Keeping Nvidia's technical edge will depend on working closely with the executives who run its chips and software. She has said she will build on what Huang left behind, arguing that Nvidia's strength has always come from its people. Her first real test lands Tuesday, November 17, when Nvidia reports third-quarter fiscal 2027 earnings.