Jensen Huang resigned as Nvidia's president, CEO and director on Thursday, effective immediately, ending a 33-year run at the company he co-founded — and before the exit was even official, Elon Musk said he wanted to hire him.

"That would be an honor," Musk wrote on X Wednesday evening, responding to a post that read: "Elon please hire Jensen." The five-word reply didn't specify a job, a company, or whether the two had discussed working together. But it signaled that Huang's employment prospects had survived the fall.

How did the ouster unfold?

The sequence moved fast. On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal reported — via Reuters — that Nvidia's board was preparing to push out its co-founder. By Thursday morning, the company had announced the transition in a press release.

Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress will serve as interim CEO while the board searches for a permanent successor. Longtime director Harvey Jones becomes Nvidia's first board chair.

The exit removes the man who built Nvidia into the chipmaker at the center of the AI boom and No. 16 on the 2026 Fortune 500. Investors had already taken the hit: Nvidia lost $450 billion in market value in the days after Huang admitted to an affair, Fortune reported.

What actually triggered the board's move?

The admitted affair was with Alice Huang, a former executive at Singapore-based Megaspeed, an Nvidia cloud partner. U.S. intelligence officials reportedly believe she was acting on behalf of Chinese intelligence, which Beijing denies. Huang publicly apologized for his infidelity on Sunday.

Nvidia's board initially stood by him. "The Board has confidence in Jensen and his leadership team," it said Sunday, even while announcing an independent investigation. The board added that it had no reason to believe company secrets or national security had been compromised.

Then the story grew. On Wednesday, the New York Times reported that Huang had also had an extramarital relationship with Kimberly Powell, Nvidia's vice president of health care, who reported directly to him. The board reportedly met that same day to decide his future.

After the resignation announcement, Reuters reported — citing two people familiar with the matter — that Huang had an intimate relationship with a third Nvidia employee. Nvidia and Huang have not confirmed that report.

Who else wants Huang?

Musk is the loudest backer, but hardly the only one. The two go back years.

In September 2024, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison recounted a dinner at Nobu in Palo Alto with Musk and Huang. "I would describe the dinner as Oracle—me and Elon begging Jensen for GPUs," Ellison said. "Please take our money. Please take our money. By the way, I got dinner. No, no, take more of it. We need you to take more of our money please."

Musk has been public about his admiration since. "I am a huge admirer of Nvidia and Jensen btw. That market cap is well-deserved," he wrote on X in March, noting that SpaceX AI and Tesla expected to keep buying Nvidia chips at scale.

The warmth runs both directions:

• In May, Musk reposted photos of the pair taken a decade apart with one word: "True."
• In October he wrote: "Old friends are the best friends. Jensen rocks," alongside a clip on space computing infrastructure.
• Huang called Musk "working on exactly the right things" in January 2025, and later dubbed him "the ultimate GPU."

Others lined up too. Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney urged the board to keep Huang, comparing a dismissal to "Apple firing Steve Jobs level of idiocy." Billionaire investor Bill Ackman argued that even exceptional people make mistakes and urged support for Huang and his family. Sequoia Capital partner Shaun Maguire criticized the conduct but called Huang "irreplaceable for America's AI leadership" — a post Musk endorsed with two words: "I agree."

Anduril founder Palmer Luckey, Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, and 37signals CTO David Heinemeier Hansson also publicly backed him.

What happens to Huang now?

The next chapter is unannounced. Musk's welcome came without a job description, and it's unclear whether Huang intends to join another company, start something new, or step back entirely.

His departure also doesn't close the legal files. Nvidia's internal investigation continues, and so does an FBI inquiry into his relationship with Alice Huang — a probe President Donald Trump has said is underway.

Financially, Huang has room to wait. He still holds about 3.6% of Nvidia, making him the fourth-largest shareholder, according to Reuters. His net worth fell roughly $10 billion this week to about $145 billion, Fortune reported, knocking him out of the world's 10 richest people.

A divorce could cut that substantially. His wife, Lori Huang, could be entitled to half, depending on marital agreements and what counts as separate property, Forbes reported. Neither has announced plans to divorce.

Before any new role, Huang heads to Capitol Hill. He has agreed to testify before lawmakers, with an appearance expected before Thanksgiving, House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Brian Mast said, according to Bloomberg. Mast has said Huang has "very serious questions to answer."

By Priya Raman