NVIDIA Jensen Huang of the Hubei Corporation has steadily risen in the rankings of the world’s richest people, while the market value of his computer chip manufacturer reached the three trillion dollar mark.
Huang reached another milestone on Friday, overtaking personal computer pioneer Michael Dell He becomes the 13th richest person in the world with a net worth of $106.1 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. His wealth has increased by more than $62 billion this year as demand for Nvidia’s artificial intelligence chips remains insatiable.
Huang, 61, is leading a new wave of tech billionaires as AI-powered “Jensanity,”, as one analyst put it, Silicon Valley is taking over. Other beneficiaries include Lisa Su, CEO of modern micro devices Inc. and Super-microcomputer Charles Liang of Inc. Last month, Huang’s net worth exceeded every single member of the Waltons, America’s richest family, after another stunning quarter for the chipmaker.
Huang’s fortune comes from his 3.5% stake in Nvidia in Santa Clara, California, which he founded in 1993 with Chris Malachowsky and Curtis Priem. Nvidia was the first computer chip company to 3 trillion US dollars in market capitalization on Wednesday, surpassing the value of Apple Inc. and flirted with this benchmark again on Friday.
Dell, 59, with a net worth of $105.9 billion, is an outsider in the computer hardware industry among the tech industry’s super-rich, who often owe their wealth to software companies. Dell made much of his fortune from his namesake company, which sells PCs and servers.
Still, Dell Technologies Inc. is benefiting from the AI industry’s recent success, as companies need servers and other infrastructure to take advantage of Nvidia’s advanced chips. Investors increasingly see Dell, along with Super Micro, as Nvidia’s preferred partner for this business.
In early March, Dell joined the small group of people whose wealth exceeded 100 billion US dollars when the company’s shares rose to a record high. The stock has since declined after the release of results that disappointed investors and the founder’s fortune shrank by nearly $12 billion in a single day.
Nvidia now has an ecosystem of hardware and software solutions that can compete with AMD. Intel Corp. is trying hard to crush or copy the competition because it has a dominant market share in high-end accelerators for artificial intelligence training.
And there are no signs that the company is slowing down or giving its competitors time to catch up. Huang said The company plans to improve its so-called AI accelerators every year.