Jensen Huang told Jay Puri, one of Nvidia’s longest-serving executives, “I hope you die and put us all out of our misery” in a closed-door meeting in February, the New York Post has reported. The Post cited people familiar with the meeting, which more than 30 senior executives attended. Huang also reportedly told Puri, “I hope you get the flu and I hope it gets worse”. Puri, who then ran Nvidia’s worldwide field operations, is said to have stayed silent. The report did not say what prompted the remarks, and a spokesperson for Huang declined to comment, while Nvidia did not immediately respond to the Post.
The account lands two days after Huang resigned as president, chief executive and director, effective immediately, during a board investigation into his conduct. Nvidia’s filing with US regulators gave no reason for his departure, and most of the reporting since then has focused on his personal relationships. The Post’s sources describe something different, however: how Huang allegedly treated the senior people who ran his company. TalkEsport has not independently verified any of the incidents described.
Sources describe outbursts in front of dozens of Nvidia executives
Puri was not the only target, according to the report. During a three-hour meeting in 2025, Huang allegedly lost his temper with a senior sales executive in front of about 40 employees and told him, “You don’t know d*** about my business”. In another meeting, the Post’s sources said, he turned on a senior executive who was attending one of his meetings for the first time. “Are you smirking at me?” Huang allegedly shouted, before telling the executive to get out.
The most serious claim involves a meeting at Nvidia’s headquarters in Santa Clara, California. Huang allegedly threw a water bottle at a senior executive there, according to the report, which did not say whether anyone was hit. The Post did not name the executives in these three incidents, and TalkEsport is not attempting to identify them. None of the people involved has commented publicly on the allegations.
The report also repeats an account that first emerged earlier this month. In August, Huang allegedly interrupted chief financial officer Colette Kress during a presentation and called her “a deer in the headlights”. Kress is now Nvidia’s interim chief executive, running the company while the board looks for a permanent successor.
Jay Puri spent 21 years building Nvidia’s sales operation before announcing his retirement
Puri, whose legal first name is Ajay, led Nvidia’s worldwide field operations, the organisation that sells its chips and systems to customers around the world. He had been an executive at the company for 21 years when he told Nvidia in late June that he planned to retire, according to a company filing. Nvidia appointed Nicholas Parker to succeed him as executive vice president of worldwide field operations, with a start date expected in late August, and said Puri would stay on in a senior advisory role.
His stake in the company also made him one of Nvidia’s executive billionaires. Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index put his wealth above $1 billion in 2025, according to Fortune, largely through Nvidia shares held directly and in trusts. Nothing in Nvidia’s filing links his retirement to the February meeting, and the Post’s report does not suggest a connection either.
Huang has long called himself a critical boss, and staff still want him back
Huang has never hidden that he is a demanding manager. At a 2024 event with Stripe’s Patrick Collison, he said, “I’d rather torture you into greatness because I believe in you,” a remark Fortune reported he described as tongue-in-cheek. In an interview with Singapore’s CNA this year, he said, “You can’t show me something without me giving you some criticism”. He added that he criticises everyone’s work “so that I can help them be better”, Fortune reported. He has also said he holds no one-on-one meetings with his roughly 60 direct reports, preferring to work through problems with the whole group.
What the Post describes goes well beyond robust criticism, yet it has not dented his support inside the company so far. In a Blind survey published before he resigned, 88% of Nvidia staff who answered said he should stay as chief executive. Since his exit, two shareholders have asked the board to keep his possible return on the table, and Elon Musk has backed an online petition calling for him to be reinstated. Even Altimeter’s Brad Gerstner, one of the two shareholders behind that letter, has called Huang “a friend & legend” while adding that “he was not a one man show”. Gerstner pointed instead to the company of 42,000 people that Huang built and the leaders who help run it.
The board, meanwhile, is weighing internal and external candidates for the job, and TalkEsport has looked at who could replace Huang. Nvidia’s official announcement of his departure named Harvey Jones as the company’s first board chair. Nvidia reports third-quarter results on 17 November, its first under Kress as interim chief executive.
