Jensen Huang has resigned as chief executive of Nvidia, the chipmaker he co-founded 33 years ago, after a second allegation about his private life. The board has appointed chief financial officer Colette Kress as interim chief executive.

The resignation was announced on Thursday, the BBC reported from its live coverage of the markets reaction. Nvidia shares were down more than 10 percent in pre-market trading ahead of the New York open.

What triggered it

Huang’s position deteriorated over a single week. On Sunday he admitted an affair with a woman reported to be from another company — a woman US officials allege was recruited by Chinese intelligence. Nvidia and the FBI are both investigating that relationship, and the company has retained a major US law firm to conduct its own inquiry.

The resignation followed a New York Times report of a second affair, this one with an executive at Nvidia itself.

The board’s statement

Nvidia’s board praised Huang while confirming his departure. “Jensen’s contributions to Nvidia are profound,” it said, calling the company “one of the most consequential technology companies in the world” and thanking him for “immeasurable contributions to the company and the industry.”

Who is Colette Kress

Kress has been executive vice president and chief financial officer since joining Nvidia in September 2013, and the board said she has “played a key role in Nvidia’s growth and evolution.” She spent nearly 25 years in finance roles at Cisco and Microsoft before that.

“Nvidia’s strength has always come from its people,” Kress said, adding she was committed to building on “the extraordinary foundation Jensen created over the last 33 years.”

BBC technology and AI editor Zoe Kleinman noted Kress is not an engineer and will need to convince investors that Nvidia’s pace of innovation continues.

Why it matters beyond Nvidia

Nvidia’s chips drive the most powerful AI models, so instability at the company carries through the wider AI industry. Beijing has separately warned Washington against using the spying allegations as a pretext to further restrict technology sales to China.

Hiru News carried the same account, attributing it to the BBC.

Not reported

Neither filing states what severance or shareholding arrangements apply to Huang, whether a permanent successor search has begun, or whether the FBI inquiry continues now that he has left the company.