In the first nine months of the administration, Huang has managed to develop a strong relationship with the president that has proved key to navigating an on-again, off-again trade war between the U.S. and China.
This dynamic was on full display at Nvidia’s GTC conference in Washington, D.C., this week, an event dubbed the “Super Bowl of AI.”
Huang wrapped a two-hour keynote, awash with compliments for the president’s efforts to boost energy and domestic manufacturing, by borrowing Trump’s signature phrase and thanking the audience for “making America great again.”
Shortly after, Huang was on a plane to South Korea, racing to get to the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum where he was hoping to cross paths with Trump before the president’s departure.
“There’s a lot of value for Jensen Huang to cozy up with Trump and feel like he’s in his good graces,” said Owen Tedford, senior research analyst with Beacon Policy Advisors.
Nvidia secured a major win earlier this year, when Trump allowed the company to sell its H20 chips to China.
In a move that has sparked national security concerns, the president signaled during his APEC trip an openness to approving sales of its next-generation Blackwell chips.
“At the same time, just with the value and the attention on Nvidia, Trump wants to be seen as being close to that, as being able to support it, encourage their growth domestically,” Tedford added. “So, I think there’s this mutually beneficial relationship that we’re seeing develop.”
At the outset of Trump’s second term, Huang was a rising star in Silicon Valley and on Wall Street as the head of one of the world’s most valuable companies.
But he had yet to reach Trump’s radar, as the president acknowledged earlier this year.
“Who the hell is he? What’s his name?” Trump said in July, recounting when he first learned of Huang. “His name is Jensen Huang of Nvidia. I said, ‘What the hell is Nvidia?’”
Nvidia, which originated as a chipmaker for video games, has seen its profile and market value explode over the past few years as its chips became integral to the AI boom.
As of late 2022, when OpenAI released ChatGPT and first gave the public a taste of AI, Nvidia had yet to reach a market capitalization of $1 trillion.
It is now the most valuable company in the world at $5 trillion, becoming the first firm to cross the historic milestone.
“Given how important Jensen’s become to the AI revolution, trade and sector, it’s not a surprise,” Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives said of the relationship between Huang and Trump.
Check out the full report Monday morning at TheHill.com.
