NVIDIA: Jensen Huang. From near collapse to becoming the world’s biggest company

**Guy Raz** (0:00)
This message is brought to you by Apple Card. Apple Card is designed with your iPhone in mind, making it easy to get started and even easier to use. Apple Card is a no-fee credit card you can apply for right from the Wallet app on your iPhone. Apple Card has no annual fee, no late fees, and no foreign transaction fees. No fees, period. Every credit card should be this easy. Get started in the Wallet app today.
Subject to credit approval, variable APRs for Apple Card range from 17.49% to 27.74% based on credit worthiness. Rates as of January 1, 2026 Existing customers can view their variable APR in the Wallet app or at card.apple.com. Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch. Terms and more at applecard.com. Success is a journey, especially when it comes to your finances. One of the most common obstacles in our financial journey is dealing with high interest debt. It can often leave people feeling trapped, but it doesn't have to. If you're dealing with high interest debt, there is a way forward. A SoFi personal loan could consolidate all your high interest debt into one low interest monthly payment, helping you craft a road map to paying down your debt. It even comes with no fees required, getting you a financial win right away. Keep pushing on your journey to financial success. You could even get as soon as the same day funding. View your rate for a SoFi personal loan at sofi.com/guyraz.
Loans originated by SoFi Bank NA, member FDIC. Terms and conditions apply. NMLS 696891
Fast funds term apply at sofi.com/guyraz.
When it comes to your health and well-being, the right care can change everything. That's why Cleveland Clinic has been elevating world-class patient care for over a century. From the most specialized heart, neurology and cancer treatments to the latest surgical innovations and beyond, Cleveland Clinic is here for every care in the world. Whether you're exploring advanced care or just looking after your health, all the info you need is waiting for you at clevelandclinic.org.
We sort of have the outlines of all of the troughs, and there were a lot of troughs. And I'm trying to even imagine quarterly earning calls in 2007 when your stock price is in the toilet, and you're putting all of this money.

**Jensen Huang** (2:51)
And Guy, I gotta tell you, it's embarrassing. It was embarrassing, it was humiliating. Your employees are probably embarrassed for you. In fact, right now, it is really quite hard for me to resurface those feelings. And the reason for that is I spent all of my time, all of my life trying to forget yesterday.
What do they teach athletes? Forget the last point.
It's about forgetting.

**Guy Raz** (3:24)
Welcome to How I Built This, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.
I'm Guy Raz, and on the show today, how Jensen Huang went from making graphics chips for gamers to powering the AI revolution and building the biggest company in the world.
If Nvidia were a country, it would be one of the five richest in the world, just behind the US and China. Nvidia's value is now more than the entire economic output of Japan or the UK or France. That's how big this company is. And it's also probably the single most important company in the world right now. It is the biggest player powering the AI revolution. But Nvidia didn't start out that way. The company actually began by selling graphics processors for video games. And for a good 20 years, gamers were Nvidia's main customers.
But back in the 2000s, the company's co-founder, Jensen Huang, made a pretty important bet. A bet that those graphics processors, known as GPUs, could actually do a lot more than just power video games. He believed these processors could be the cornerstone for the future of supercomputing. This was a very bold and very expensive idea. Now, bear with me for a moment here, because if you're not super familiar with the technical terms around AI and computing, I will do my best to explain. So think of a computer like a kitchen. The CPU, or Central Processing Unit, is like a master chef. It's really smart, it can do almost anything, but it can only cook a small number of dishes at a time. The GPU, or Graphics Processing Unit, is like a kitchen with thousands of line cooks. Each one isn't as talented as the chef, but together these guys can crank out thousands of simple tasks all at once.
Now to make that kitchen do even more, Jensen poured billions of dollars into developing a platform and software layer called CUDA, which is basically the instruction manual that lets you use all those line cooks in entirely new ways. So what CUDA basically did is turn the GPU from a video game tool into a general purpose supercomputer.