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Directors are still choosing a search firm. Haas previously spent seven years at Nvidia, while finance chief Colette Kress holds the interim CEO role.
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Nvidia’s succession process has not reached candidate engagement: directors are still selecting an outside search firm and say both internal and external leaders remain in scope. That leaves Rene Haas’s reported approach unconfirmed as a candidacy; the Arm CEO previously spent seven years at Nvidia. CFO Colette Kress is interim CEO while the board works toward a permanent replacement for Jensen Huang.
Nvidia told CNBC on November 13 that it had not formally engaged any potential CEO candidates.
The Financial Times reported that Nvidia’s board approached Haas, but that does not establish he agreed to become a candidate.
Haas joined Arm in 2013 after seven years at Nvidia, where he held roles including vice president of computing products.
Nvidia’s next permanent chief executive remains an open question after its board said it had not formally engaged any potential candidates. The statement to CNBC on November 13 followed Financial Times reporting that Arm CEO Rene Haas had been approached in the search for a successor to Jensen Huang.
The Financial Times reported Friday that Nvidia’s board had approached Haas, citing people familiar with the matter, according to CNBC’s account. An approach does not establish that Haas has agreed to become a candidate or take the job. The board called speculation about individual successors, whether internal or external, premature.
Directors also outlined a procedural step still underway: choosing the outside firm that will help identify potential successors. “We are in the process of selecting a search firm for the Nvidia CEO role,” the board told CNBC in its Friday statement.
We have not formally engaged any potential candidates.
Nvidia’s board, in a November 13 statement to CNBC
Haas would not be new to the company. Before joining Arm in 2013, he spent seven years at Nvidia, serving in several roles, including vice president of its computing products business, CNBC reported. He now leads the SoftBank-backed chip company, giving him both a prior Nvidia career and experience running another business in the industry.
The succession process follows Nvidia’s Thursday announcement that Huang would step down as CEO. The company named Chief Financial Officer Colette Kress interim chief executive, placing its finance leader in charge during the transition rather than naming a permanent replacement.
Nvidia said its search would consider both internal and external candidates. That leaves the board two routes for the permanent appointment: promote someone from within the company or recruit a leader from outside it.
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