Jensen Huang, Time’s 100 Most Influential People of 2021

Artificial intelligence is transforming our world. The software that enables computers to do things that once required human perception and judgment depends largely on hardware made possible by Jensen Huang.

In 2003, amid great skepticism, Huang directed his company Nvidia to adapt chips designed to paint graphics on computer screens, known as graphics processing units or GPUs, to perform other, more general-purpose computing tasks. The resulting advancements—and powerful chips—laid a foundation that could accommodate much bigger neural networks, the programs behind much of today’s AI. In the process, he has helped enable a revolution that allows phones to answer questions out loud, farms to spray weeds but not crops, doctors to predict the properties of new drugs—with more wonders to come.

Huang’s gamble paid off largely because he is among the world’s most technically savvy CEOs. He’s also a compassionate steward of his employees and a generous supporter of education in science and technology. With still emerging AI technologies creating an insatiable hunger for more computation, Huang’s team is well-positioned to keep driving technological advances for decades to come.

Ng is founder of DeepLearning.AI, founder and CEO of Landing AI, and chairman and co-founder of Coursera