Nvidia hired Nick Parker, a 26-year Microsoft veteran, as its new executive vice president of Worldwide Field Operations, replacing Jay Puri, who announced his retirement in June after 21 years and will transition to an advisory role. Parker, who joins next month, most recently served as executive vice president and chief business officer of Microsoft's worldwide sales and solutions organization; prior to his departure, he had accepted a role leading Microsoft's new $2.5 billion Microsoft Frontier Company, which connects 6,000 engineers and industry experts with customers to help with AI. Per a securities filing, Parker's pay package at Nvidia includes $40 million in stock awards, a $5 million signing bonus, and a $1 million annual base salary. The hire signals to Wall Street that Nvidia is not "resting on its laurels" as the dominant AI chipmaker, according to David Nicholson, chief technology advisor at The Futurum Group. Parker inherits the challenge of helping customers successfully deploy AI, bringing deep relationships with governments, cloud providers, and other partners, said Brad Gastwirth, global head of research and market intelligence at Circular Technology.