Newshot 黄仁勋 in August lashed out at 英伟达's new interim CEO 克雷斯, calling her "a CFO who just reports the numbers" and "a deer caught in the headlights"
IT Home, November 13 — Before leaving, 英伟达 co-founder 黄仁勋 clashed fiercely with then-CFO and now interim CEO 科莱特 克雷斯 (Colette Kress) over the company's aggressive AI infrastructure financing strategy.
According to a Wall Street Journal report on November 12 local time, 黄仁勋 publicly criticized 克雷斯 at an executive meeting in August this year, accusing her of being merely "a CFO responsible for reporting" rather than someone who could help him set strategy and make decisions.
According to a person familiar with the conversation, while 克雷斯 was giving her report, 黄仁勋 cut her off directly and said she was "like a deer caught in the headlights."
People familiar with the matter said that this summer, 黄仁勋 convened a meeting of several senior finance executives at 英伟达 to discuss the company's expanding investment and financing commitments in AI infrastructure. During the meeting, then-CFO 克雷斯 was giving a report when 黄仁勋 interrupted her and made the remark.
At the time, 黄仁勋 wanted to get to the bottom of a growing problem: 英伟达 was in talks with companies that could not directly afford its chips, considering providing billions of dollars in financing guarantees to help them obtain funding. Some of these deals were led by 黄仁勋's son-in-law Nico 卡普雷兹 (Nico Caprez), who has been providing financing support to emerging cloud service providers and data center developers, hoping to cultivate these companies into long-term 英伟达 customers.
According to people familiar with the matter, 黄仁勋 had previously actively pushed a series of AI infrastructure deals, but as the related commitments continued to grow, he also began to question whether these investments had exceeded a reasonable scope.
黄仁勋 then talked about the pressure 英伟达 faced. He believed that large cloud service providers were gradually reducing their dependence on 英伟达 and turning to consider alternative chips. At the same time, large quantities of chip wafers and memory that 英伟达 had previously committed to purchase would arrive one after another, creating enormous inventory and supply chain pressure. He described these commitments as an "avalanche" bearing down on him.
Now, 克雷斯 needs to take over one of the world's most valuable technology companies and find every possible way to handle the complex situation 黄仁勋 left behind.
On the issue of financing guarantees, the differences between 克雷斯 and 黄仁勋 were especially stark. This spring, 卡普雷兹 and another 英伟达 vice president, 拉杰・米尔普里 (Raj Mirpuri), told potential business partners that the company could arrange credit support deals within weeks. Dozens of companies lined up hoping to join the program to obtain 英伟达's credit support and lower financing costs. In exchange, 英伟达 required cloud service providers to share part of their revenue.
People involved in the work said 克雷斯 raised multiple questions about these deals, including how to decide which projects were worth pursuing, how to assess guarantee risk, and how to calculate return on investment. People who worked with her said she also tried behind the scenes to limit the pace of the related deals promoted by 黄仁勋's son-in-law. 卡普雷兹 had been promoted to 英伟达 vice president in January this year.
Clearly, 英伟达 did not stop the related plans at the time. At that point, the company was negotiating with OpenAI, hoping to provide financing guarantees for its large data center project in Ohio, USA. OpenAI planned to lease the entire campus and deploy about $300 billion (IT Home note: about RMB 2.01 trillion at current exchange rates) worth of 英伟达 chips. Because OpenAI would need to bear long-term lease payments, 英伟达's financial guarantee would help boost banks' confidence in lending.
On July 26 this year, the Wall Street Journal reported that 英伟达 was considering providing about $250 billion (about RMB 1.67 trillion at current exchange rates) in financing guarantees for the project. After the news came out, 英伟达's stock fell about 5% the next day, wiping out about $250 billion (about RMB 1.67 trillion at current exchange rates) in market value.
According to people familiar with the matter, although 英伟达 and OpenAI were close to reaching a deal at the time, 克雷斯 later reworked the plan, cutting the financial commitment 英伟达 initially considered providing by about half. The two sides ultimately signed the reduced agreement on August 17.
Documents 英伟达 submitted to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) also disclosed the related guarantee arrangements. The company later reached an agreement with SB Energy to provide up to $105 billion (about RMB 701.932 billion at current exchange rates) in financing guarantees for the PORTS Technology Campus data center park in Ohio, involving lease arrangements for about 4.25 gigawatts of IT load. The related guarantees will take effect gradually based on data center construction and leasing progress and are subject to specific conditions.
During this period, 黄仁勋 also asked employees to develop a method for assessing whether financing guarantees were worth pursuing, taking into account the chip sales revenue these deals might generate.
The Wall Street Journal also reported in late August that 英伟达 had paused some deals in its new financing plan. The plan had originally sought to provide credit support to AI cloud service providers in exchange for a share of revenue. When conveying the pause to customers, 卡普雷兹 and Mirpuri said that 英伟达's executive team and board were strengthening review of the related deals, making projects increasingly difficult to finalize quickly.
Facing outside questions about circular financing, 克雷斯 had publicly defended 英伟达's role as a financing backer in the AI industry. She believed these deals could generate considerable investment returns and disagreed with outside criticism of the related model.
"We recognize the scale of this support, and we know some people will call it circular financing. But we see it differently," 克雷斯 said in August this year. "The equity returns we get from the capital we put in will be very substantial."
At the same time, 黄仁勋 was increasingly dissatisfied with 英伟达's stock market valuation. According to the Wall Street Journal, 英伟达's average monthly price-to-earnings ratio fell from 23 times in May this year to 16 times in October. To ease investor concerns, the company also took measures including large-scale share buybacks.
By October this year, 黄仁勋 began to tighten external financial support. At a meeting in Berlin, Germany, he led several sales executives in meeting with the CEOs of six large 英伟达 chip buyers and conveyed a new business strategy through a story about a soup stall in Japan.
黄仁勋 said he once saw a long line in front of a soup stall in Japan and joined the queue. After a long wait, he drank one of the best bowls of soup of his life, but when he asked for another bowl, the stall owner refused because there were still many customers behind him and the stock was not enough.
黄仁勋 then told the cloud computing company CEOs present that the soup stall owner understood business better than they did, because he would not sell all his stock to one or two customers, but instead maintained the price and kept the customer base diverse. "You haven't let my products reflect the value they should have," 黄仁勋 said.
This internal conflict took place against the backdrop of 英伟达's large-scale push into AI infrastructure investment. 克雷斯 focused more on risk control for financing guarantees, deal returns, and financial responsibility, while 黄仁勋 hoped to use financial support to further expand market demand for 英伟达 chips. Their differences over the related deals also reflected the management challenge 英伟达 faces in promoting AI industry expansion while controlling its own financial risk.
On November 12 local time, 英伟达 officially announced that 黄仁勋 had resigned as company president, chief executive officer, and board member, and that 克雷斯 would take over as interim CEO while continuing as CFO. The company's board said it would consider both internal and external candidates in searching for a permanent successor.
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