NVIDIA Makes 23 Trillion Won Profit on 35 Trillion Won Sales, New Employee Salary is a Whopping

At least 230 million KRW as of last year
Stock price growth expected to increase further this year

Revenue of $26 billion (approximately 35 trillion KRW). Operating profit of $16.9 billion (approximately 23 trillion KRW). Operating margin of 65%. These are the first-quarter results of Nvidia, currently the world's largest semiconductor company. Emerging as the undisputed leader in AI (artificial intelligence) semiconductors, Nvidia has become an object of admiration not only for investors but also within the industry.

So, how much is the annual salary of a new employee who actually joins Nvidia? Generally, Silicon Valley companies rarely disclose engineer salary information. However, approximate figures can be inferred through voluntary contributions from current and former employees.

New employee annual salary exceeds 200 million KRW... expected to increase further this year

NVIDIA headquarters building in Santa Clara, California, USA. [Image source=NVIDIA]

'Levels fyi' is an open-source site where Silicon Valley engineers voluntarily post their offered salaries. Engineers working in Silicon Valley use this platform to gauge the approximate offered salaries of big tech companies and assess their own market value accordingly. Many salary contributions from Nvidia employees are also posted.

According to information from the site, Nvidia offered new software engineers a base salary of about $144,000 (approximately 200 million KRW) and stock options worth $25,000 (approximately 35 million KRW) last year. This amounts to a total of $169,000 (approximately 235 million KRW).

The annual salary for new employees is expected to increase further this year. At the end of last year, Nvidia's stock price was in the $400 to $500 range, but it more than doubled at the beginning of this year. After the first-quarter earnings announcement, the stock price even surpassed $1,000 in over-the-counter trading. This means the value of stock options granted to employees has also increased.

In fact, as Nvidia's stock price soared, employee salaries reportedly rose sharply. The U.S. business media outlet 'Business Insider' reported that Nvidia's mid-level managers earned an annual salary of around $1 million (approximately 1.36 billion KRW) as of last year.

CEO cuts salary to $1 while focusing on talent acquisition

Jensen Huang, Founder and CEO of NVIDIA
[Photo by Reuters]

Thanks to this, Nvidia is currently regarded as a 'talent black hole' in the industry. Skilled semiconductor design personnel are drawn to Nvidia, and employees who have already joined rarely leave.

Nvidia's turnover rate is 5.3%, about four times lower than the semiconductor industry average turnover rate of 19.2%. Nvidia employees have strong company loyalty, referring to themselves as 'Nvidians,' and are said to especially revere Jensen Huang, the founder and CEO.

Meanwhile, CEO Huang is also passionate about talent acquisition. A representative example demonstrating his desire for excellent talent was during the 2008 financial crisis. At that time, Nvidia's performance and stock price plummeted, pushing the company to the brink of bankruptcy. Huang cut his own salary to $1 and used the remaining funds to secure research and development (R&D) personnel to overcome the crisis.

This contrasts with other big tech companies, which have responded to poor performance by laying off 10-20% of their workforce and boosting stock prices through share buybacks.