"This guy" founded the company in 1993 and is still leading it, quite capably, 30 years later. It is often said that many startups need one type of CEO at founding but it takes a different skill set to be CEO of an established company. To lead it from 3 people to 25,000+, to have both technical chops, business chops, and PR chops is a rare combination.
Back in the early 90s there were countless 3D chip startups, probably more than 35 (I was at two of them during those years) and they fell one by one until essentially only Nvidia and ATI remained. Ask the other 33 CEOs if they think Jensen was just lucky.
Jensen believed that GPGPU could be a new market and spent heavily to push the idea and to make it real. Significant design work and silicon area was spent adding GPGPU features to chips before there was any software or any market for it. He invested in building compiler teams and writing libraries. He invested millions each year hosting a GPGPU conference and driving the vision. No, he didn't write those libraries or design the silicon, but it was his vision and willingness to invest in it that deserves respect. He isn't some schlub that simply got lucky one time. He has been manufacturing "luck" for 30 years.
Back in the early 90s there were countless 3D chip startups, probably more than 35 (I was at two of them during those years) and they fell one by one until essentially only Nvidia and ATI remained. Ask the other 33 CEOs if they think Jensen was just lucky.
Jensen believed that GPGPU could be a new market and spent heavily to push the idea and to make it real. Significant design work and silicon area was spent adding GPGPU features to chips before there was any software or any market for it. He invested in building compiler teams and writing libraries. He invested millions each year hosting a GPGPU conference and driving the vision. No, he didn't write those libraries or design the silicon, but it was his vision and willingness to invest in it that deserves respect. He isn't some schlub that simply got lucky one time. He has been manufacturing "luck" for 30 years.