What would CEO of world's most valuable company study if he was in college today? Jensen Huang says...

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has revealed that if he were a student today, he would choose to study physical sciences over software. Speaking during a visit to Beijing, Huang was asked what a 22-year-old version of himself would focus on in 2025. He replied that he would likely study more of the physical sciences than software sciences.

Huang graduated in electrical engineering from Oregon State University at age 20 and later earned a master’s degree from Stanford University. In 1993, he co-founded Nvidia, which recently became the world’s most valuable company with a market value of $4 trillion.

Physical sciences include subjects like physics, chemistry, astronomy, and earth sciences — areas that focus on non-living systems. Although Huang didn’t explain in detail why he’d choose this field today, he has spoken about the rising importance of “Physical AI.”

Over the last decade, Huang explained, artificial intelligence has gone through different stages. The first was “Perception AI,” which focused on helping machines recognize images, such as with the famous AlexNet model in 2012. The second wave was “Generative AI,” which can create text, images, and code by understanding meaning.

Today, we are in the phase of “Reasoning AI,” where AI can not only understand and create, but also solve problems using logic and common sense. Huang calls this form of AI “agentic AI” — digital robots that can act like a digital workforce.

Looking into the future, Huang believes the next big step is “Physical AI.” This new wave will need knowledge of real-world physics like friction, force, and object movement. It will help machines understand actions like gripping an object or predicting a moving ball’s direction.