Curtis Priem has always been a man turned forward. Even in the emerging days of computer graphics and video games, he saw the great potential that advanced for visual technology.
Priem has devoted its time and energy to graphic technology, creating the first graphic processor for a PC, the IBM professional graphics adapter, according to its Alma Mater, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI).
But there is an event on which PRIEM looks back with regret: if he had kept all the stock he formerly possessed in AI, software and mastodon of NVIDIA computer hardware, he would be one of the richest people alive with a net value north of $ 70 billion, according to a Forbes estimate.
Instead, Priem is now worth around 30 million dollars, according to Forbes, which is more than enough to make it live in comfort. PRIEM lives in an out -of -network house near Fremont, California, not far from the headquarters of the company he co -founded in 1993.
Start of a career
Priem attended RPI in Troy, New York, graduated in 1982 with a diploma in computer engineering.
His first job after obtaining his RPI diploma was with the technological company now disappeared Vermont Microsystems. But it was a move to California to work at Sun Microsystems who would disrupt his career.
In the sun, Priem played a central role in the development of the abovementioned graphics card, making its brand on the world of technology and establishing itself as a leading figure in the world of design and development.
NVIDIA Foundation
As History says – corroborated in a Stanford business school interview Jensen HuangCEO of Nvidia – Huang, Priem, and the other co -founder of Nvidia, Chris Malachowsky, met in a restaurant in Silicon Valley Denny to discuss their potential partnership.
Malachowsky worked at Sun Microsystems with Priem, while Huang had worked both in LSI Logic and Advanced Micro Devices. And, famous, before obtaining his diploma from the State University of Oregon with an electrical engineering diploma (he would add a master of Stanford in the same area later), Huang worked as dishwasher at Denny’s.
NVIDIA was founded on April 15, 1993. The founders shared a “vision to bring 3D graphics to the games of games and multimedia” and worked tirelessly to do so, Nvidia inventing the first world GPU, or graphic processing unit, in 1999.
The same year, NVIDIA became public, its IPO which took place on January 22, 1999. The shares were valued at $ 12 each.
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Post-nvidia
In 2025, Nvidia’s actions had reached a peak just under $ 150. This represents a massive increase in value for the company, which had the share price of less than $ 6 at the end of 2019.
Nvidia’s push can be directly linked to the recent rise in AI. The long dedication of the company to the processing of complicated graphics has made the world of the complex world of IT world of artificial intelligence.
This wave led to Net value Jensen Huang Estimates above $ 115 billion, an amazing sum of any comparison, and it is about 3,833 times more than the net value of its former partner, Priem.
A private man according to most accounts, we do not know exactly why Priem left Nvidia. He moved into his house off network in a relatively remote corner of California and rarely ventures today, except to make several annual visits to his Alma Mater, RPI, with which he was actively involved.
Priem is a philanthropist of note and, including the overabundance of the money he gave after the IPO of Nvidia, he continued to give money via his own foundation of the Priem family.