The campaign to reinstate Nvidia’s former CEO has attracted support from some of Silicon Valley’s most influential executives, including Elon Musk, who warns that the company’s business relationships may depend heavily on Huang’s personal ties

Elon Musk and some of Silicon Valley’s most influential executives are rallying behind Jensen Huang, turning a petition demanding his reinstatement into a high-profile challenge to the decision that pushed Nvidia’s former CEO out of the company’s board. The campaign, titled “Stand with Jensen,” has gathered more than 100,000 signatures in a matter of hours, drawing support from prominent figures in the technology industry and raising questions about the process that led to Huang’s departure amid a sexual scandal.

Musk has publicly promoted the initiative on X, arguing that Nvidia could lose more than a celebrated executive if Huang is not brought back. The company’s success, he suggested, rests partly on commercial relationships that Huang built personally over the years — arrangements that may prove difficult to preserve without him.

“Jensen Huang brilliantly managed Nvidia’s supply chain, but many of those deals were handshakes with Jensen, not written contracts,” Musk wrote. “Without him, at least some of those crucial deals will be lost.” His intervention gives the campaign a business dimension beyond the demand for fair treatment: the argument is that Huang’s personal influence has become an asset to Nvidia itself.

Musk is not alone. Amjad Masad, chief executive of Replit, has also promoted the petition, alongside Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney and Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan. Their support has helped give the campaign visibility among technology leaders at a moment when Nvidia’s leadership and corporate relationships are under intense scrutiny.

The petition’s organizers are challenging the circumstances surrounding Huang’s departure. Signatories say they are concerned that he was removed “without adequate and proper process” and are asking Nvidia’s board to reinstate him while an independent investigation establishes the facts. “Jensen deserves due process, not summary justice,” the petition states.

The figures published on the petition platform indicate the scale of the mobilization. They list 6,800 signatures from current Nvidia employees, 74,100 from shareholders and another 55,600 from Huang supporters — a combined total of 136,500.

At the heart of the campaign is a demand that the company distinguish between the allegations surrounding Huang and the procedure used to address them. Its supporters want the board to suspend any final judgment on his position until an independent inquiry has clarified the facts. For now, the petition has turned that demand into a public test of confidence in Nvidia’s handling of the controversy — with some of the technology industry’s most prominent executives openly taking Huang’s side.

(Photo: © AndKronos)