Professional Manager Takes Over, Decisions May Turn Conservative
Global AI chip leader NVIDIA announced that Jensen Huang has resigned as President, CEO and Director, with CFO Colette Kress serving as interim CEO while continuing as CFO. Taishin Shin Kong Financial Holding chief economist Li Zhenyu said on the 13th that this will affect NVIDIA's decision-making speed, the pace of AI rack upgrades, and funding and landscape for the overall AI supply chain, bringing far-reaching structural impacts. He believes letting Jensen Huang leave was a wrong decision, and the possibility of Jensen Huang returning is low.
King Steps Down, Impacting the Pace of AI Advancement
Li Zhenyu used Apple's succession as an analogy, noting that after Jensen Huang steps down, his successor may follow the path of Tim Cook succeeding Steve Jobs, moving toward professional-manager governance. Professional managers must answer to the board and cannot command like a king as Jensen Huang did; decisions will slow, turn conservative, and significantly drag down the pace of U.S. AI advancement. This is the larger impact, will certainly happen, and is what the U.S. administration worries about most. He cited Steve Jobs being forced out of Apple at age 30 and returning strongly 12 years later at age 42, contrasting with Jensen Huang, now 63, to judge the chance of a return as low, arguing he should have been kept on with stronger oversight, because only he can drive AI speed, no professional manager can do so, and his departure is a huge loss for the U.S. AI industry.
Taiwan Supply Chain: Short-Term Strength, Long-Term Weakness; Orders Secure for Two Quarters
On the impact for Taiwan's supply chain, Li Zhenyu described it as short-term strength but long-term weakness. In the short term, with current CFO Colette Kress serving as acting CEO, as she is unfamiliar with technology, her most important job will be to capture every cent that NVIDIA can earn, so specifications and orders already finalized for the next two quarters will proceed as planned, leaving Taiwan makers' near-term profits secure. The real challenge lies in the specification battle for new racks from the second half of 2027 to 2028; if the new CEO slows the pace of technology advancement, the incentive for Taiwan makers to commit huge capital expenditures and aggressively expand capacity may disappear. Rapid upgrades of servers and racks are the core engine of this rally in Taiwan stocks; once that momentum weakens, the long-term dream-driven rally in Taiwan AI concept stocks will inevitably face a harsh P/E correction.
CSP Bargaining Power and Financing, Regulatory Pressures Add Variables
At the same time, NVIDIA's bargaining power over the four major cloud service providers will be greatly reduced. Li Zhenyu believes pressure from the four major cloud service providers on NVIDIA will rise sharply in the future, and they may turn to in-house chips, no longer willing to be led by NVIDIA, with pressure on the AI chip ecosystem gradually emerging. Even so, the impact on TSMC will be minimal, as AI development will not stall; no matter who designs the chips, manufacturing will ultimately still rely on TSMC foundry production, and TSMC's challenge is instead how to flexibly allocate capacity to match the next round of chip specifications. On funding and geopolitics, emerging cloud providers in the past relied on ties with NVIDIA to obtain cheap financing; with Jensen Huang's departure and a more cautious CFO, banks and NVIDIA itself may tighten their stance on AI financing, sharply pushing up funding costs for related companies. As the core of the global AI supply chain, Taiwan has in the past often turned a blind eye to export flows; now with a tougher U.S. stance, Taiwan's supply chain must proactively clean up its act, which will be an unavoidable heavy pressure and responsibility for the industry.