New San Francisco Art College Receives $75 Million From NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang

By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy. We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. The San Francisco campus of Vanderbilt University has received a landmark $75 million donation from NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang and his wife Lori to set up a new art college. The new institution will be named the Jen-Hsun and Lori Huang College of Art, Architecture and Design, pending the university’s approval. The institution is also currently seeking a dean for its inaugural academic year. Set to open in November 2027, the Jen-Hsun and Lori Huang College of Art, Architecture and Design will occupy the premises of the California College of the Arts (CCA), the last non-profit art school in the state. The institution had been plagued by declining enrollment and budget deficits which resulted in staff layoffs, culminating in Vanderbilt’s purchase of the institution early this year. Under the purchase agreement, CCA will wind down its operations at the end of the 2026–27 academic year. This gift represents the single largest donation by the Huangs to an educational institution, exceeding the $50 million given to his alma mater, Oregon State. Together with the $22.5 million donated in February of last year, Huang’s donations to the school now amount to $97.5 million. The Huangs have also inspired additional philanthropic donations of $25 million to Vanderbilt’s San Francisco expansion so far. In a statement, Jensen Huang described the donation as one that aims to cultivate the next generation of creators to solidify San Francisco’s culture of creativity and innovation. “Technology expands what we can build. Art and design determine why we build it. Together they shape civilization,” said Huang. Both Jensen and Lori Huang are engineers, and the former leads NVIDIA, one of the world’s most valuable companies and a leading player in the global artificial intelligence boom. The Huangs’ gift to Vanderbilt University’s new campus was accompanied by an invitation to contribute to the institution’s expansion in San Francisco, which has secured over 40 percent of the funds required to realize the full match by December 31, 2028.