Nvidia Hires CFO After A Two-year Search
Nvidia said on Monday it had appointed a former Cisco and Microsoft executive as its new chief financial officer, ending a search of more than two years after its previous CFO left.
Colette Kress, age 46, will take over later this month and will report to Jen-Hsun Huang, NVIDIA's president and chief executive officer. Kress replaces interim CFO Karen Burns, who stepped in after Nvidia's previous CFO David White left in May 2011 for personal reasons.
"We have searched extensively for the right candidate and are thrilled to have Colette join us," said Huang. "She brings fantastic experience, excellent financial management skills and deep industry knowledge to NVIDIA. Colette will be a great asset as we work to extend our global leadership in visual computing, mobile and the cloud. I want to thank Karen Burns for her truly outstanding work as interim CFO as we conducted our search."
Kress most recently served for three years as senior vice president and chief financial officer at Cisco's Business Technology and Operations Finance organization. She was responsible for financial strategy, planning, reporting and business development for all business segments, engineering and operations.
Previously, she spent 13 years at Microsoft, including four years as chief financial officer of the Server and Tools division, and held senior roles in corporate planning and finance. Prior to that, she served at Texas Instruments in a variety of finance positions.
Kress holds a B.Sc. degree in Finance from University of Arizona and an MBA from Southern Methodist University.
The appointment of a new CFO was seen as unlikely to mark any major changes at Nvidia, which is expanding into tablets and smartphones as its core business of selling graphics chips for personal computers faces pressure.
"We have searched extensively for the right candidate and are thrilled to have Colette join us," said Huang. "She brings fantastic experience, excellent financial management skills and deep industry knowledge to NVIDIA. Colette will be a great asset as we work to extend our global leadership in visual computing, mobile and the cloud. I want to thank Karen Burns for her truly outstanding work as interim CFO as we conducted our search."
Kress most recently served for three years as senior vice president and chief financial officer at Cisco's Business Technology and Operations Finance organization. She was responsible for financial strategy, planning, reporting and business development for all business segments, engineering and operations.
Previously, she spent 13 years at Microsoft, including four years as chief financial officer of the Server and Tools division, and held senior roles in corporate planning and finance. Prior to that, she served at Texas Instruments in a variety of finance positions.
Kress holds a B.Sc. degree in Finance from University of Arizona and an MBA from Southern Methodist University.
The appointment of a new CFO was seen as unlikely to mark any major changes at Nvidia, which is expanding into tablets and smartphones as its core business of selling graphics chips for personal computers faces pressure.
