TL;DR: Jensen Huang often says he wakes up sweating, believing Nvidia is only 30 days away from bankruptcy. This isn't hyperbole; it is a trauma response to a history of near-death experiences. Nvidia’s rise to a multi-trillion dollar entity wasn't a straight line of "hard work." It was a series of miracles, gambles, and terrifying close calls. This story teaches us the most critical lesson in business: Success is not an SOP (Standard Operating Procedure). It is a function of simply staying alive long enough to be ready when the wave finally comes.
James here, CEO of Mercury Technology Solutions.
There is a story circulating online about a recent interview with Jensen Huang. While the stories are familiar to those of us who have followed the history of AI—from Geoffrey Hinton’s Deep Belief Networks to Alex Krizhevsky’s AlexNet—hearing them compiled in one narrative is striking.
Jensen famously claims that he wakes up every morning with the feeling that "Nvidia is 30 days away from going out of business."
Most people think this is CEO humility or dramatic flair. It isn't. It is a reflection of factual history.
The Anatomy of a Miracle
If you look at Nvidia’s timeline, it shouldn't exist.
- 1995: Their first architecture was a disaster. They were nearly bankrupt. They bet half the company's remaining cash on a "Tape-out" gamble.
- The Sega Moment: If the CEO of Sega hadn't agreed to invest $5 million after Nvidia failed their contract, there would be no Nvidia today. The probability of that mercy was less than 0.1%.
- The CUDA Winter: They spent years building CUDA. Nobody wanted it. Their market cap collapsed from $12 billion to $2 billion. Wall Street laughed at them.
- The DGX Gamble: They spent billions developing the DGX-1 supercomputer with zero orders. It was only saved because a then-niche non-profit called OpenAI (and Elon Musk) decided to buy the first one.
If Sega hadn't invested? Dead.
If TSMC hadn't agreed to skip test production for the Riva 128? Dead.
If Elon Musk hadn't bought that first supercomputer? The deep learning revolution might have been delayed by years, and Nvidia would have missed it.
Success and Hard Work
We hate to admit this in business school, but success cannot be fully engineered. Failures can be replicated, but success is often a singularity.
The formula isn't: Effort = Success.
The formula is: Effort x Luck x Timing x Survival = Success.
Without AlexNet, without Geoffrey Hinton, without ImageNet—there is no AI wave for Nvidia to ride. Jensen Huang didn't create the wave; he built a surfboard (GPUs/CUDA) and spent 20 years paddling in the ocean, waiting for a wave that might never have come.
The Intel Warning: "Only the Paranoid Survive"
It reminds me of Intel. Decades ago, Andy Grove, the legendary CEO of Intel, wrote the book Only the Paranoid Survive. It was a proud, aggressive title for a company at its peak.
Today, Intel is struggling to stay relevant, while the company that was actually paranoid—Nvidia—has eclipsed it.
This proves that the fate of a tech company is more like a surfer on the ocean than a builder on land.
- Today you are on top of the world (Intel in the 90s).
- Tomorrow, the tide shifts, and you are underwater.
- Today you are ignored (Nvidia in 2010).
- Tomorrow, you are the most valuable company on earth.
There are no "natural winners." There is only the tide.
The Strategic Imperative: Longevity and Readiness
So, if success is largely luck and timing, what is the point of strategy?
The point is Longevity.
Nvidia didn't "cause" the AI revolution. But they were the only ones left standing with the right hardware when the revolution happened.
Business is not a sprint to the finish line. It is a game of attrition.
- You must manage your cash flow to survive the "winter" (like Nvidia during the CUDA years).
- You must keep your team intact when the market ignores you.
- You must continue building capacity even when there is no demand.
You cannot control when the wave comes. You can only control whether you are still standing on the beach when it arrives.
Conclusion: Don't Look for an SOP. Look for Resilience.
Many entrepreneurs look for a "Success SOP"—a step-by-step guide to winning. It doesn't exist.
Success is a rare permutation of events.
- Readiness: Are you building the skills and infrastructure (like CUDA) that will be needed, even if they aren't needed yet?
- Longevity: Can you structure your business to survive the 10 years of silence before the noise starts?
Nvidia burned cash for 20 years waiting for this moment.
Intel dominated for 20 years and lost it in 5.
The lesson? Stay paranoid. Stay alive. Because the only thing worse than missing the wave is seeing the wave coming, but being too dead to ride it.
