Hugging Face CEO vows to keep fighting for open-source AI after Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang steps down

Hugging Face CEO Clément Delangue spoke out about Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang stepping down, calling it a sad day and vowing to continue supporting open-source AI with greater effort. Nvidia announced in September that it would acquire Hugging Face for 12.9 billion dollars, its second-largest acquisition ever, and the deal is still planned to close in the first half of 2027; Reuters reported in October that the U.S. Department of Justice had made inquiries about the deal's impact on competition in the AI market. Nvidia promised to keep supporting the platform's openness after the acquisition, but the deal will also give it control of a major AI model distribution channel. Jensen Huang has long publicly supported open-weight models, and in July posted on X a policy letter co-signed by 25 companies including Microsoft and Meta, urging the U.S. government not to overly restrict open-weight models. TechCrunch analysis said the statement suggests Jensen Huang's departure worries open-source supporters, and Delangue is trying to reassure them.