I hope you find a craft that you want to dedicate your lifetime to perfecting.

Ladies and gentlemen, President Rosenbaum, esteemed faculty members, distinguished guests, proud parents, and above all, the 2024 graduating class of Caltech!

This is a really happy day for you guys.

You got to look more excited.

You know you're graduating from Caltech.

This is the school of the great Richard Feynman,

Linus Pauling, and someone who's very influential to me and our industry,

Carver Mead. Yeah, this is a very big deal.

Today is a day of immense pride and joy.

It is a dream come true for all of you, but not just for you, because your parents and families have made countless sacrifices to see you reach this milestone.

So, let's take this moment and congratulate them, thank them, and let them know you love them.

Your journey here is a testament of your character, your determination, willingness to make sacrifices for your dreams, and you should be proud.

The ability to make sacrifices, endure pain and suffering, you will need these qualities in life.

You and I share some things in common.

First, both chief scientists of NVIDIA were from Caltech.

One of the reasons why I'm giving the speech today is because I'm recruiting.

You and I share a passion for science and engineering, and although we're separated by about 40 years, we are both at the peaks of our career.

For all of you who've been paying attention to NVIDIA and myself, you know what I mean. It's just that in your case, you'll have many, many more peaks to go.

Last year, I was honored to give the commencement address at Taiwan University.

I shared several stories about NVIDIA's journey, and the lessons that we learned that might be valuable for graduates.

I have to admit that I don't love giving advice, especially to other people's children.

My advice today will largely be disguised in some stories that I've enjoyed, and some life experiences that I've enjoyed.

I'm the longest running tech CEO in the world today.

Over the course of 31 years,

I managed not to go out of business, not get bored, and not get fired.

I have the great privilege of enjoying a lot of life's experiences, starting from creating NVIDIA from nothing to what it is today.

I spoke about the long road of creating CUDA, a programming model.

The programming model that we dedicated over 20 years to invent, and that is revolutionizing computing today.

I spoke about a very quite public canceled Sega game console project we worked on, something that I know Richard Feynman cares very deeply about and spoke quite often about, where intellectual honesty and humility saved our company, and how a strategic retreat was one of our best strategies.

All of these are counterintuitive lessons that I spoke about at the commencement.

But I encouraged the graduates to engage with AI, the most consequential technology of our time.

Well, with no more markets to turn to, we decided to build something where we are sure there are no customers.

Because one of the things you can definitely guarantee is where there are no customers, there are also no competitors, and nobody cares about you.

So, we chose a market with no customers, a $0 billion market, and it was robotics.

We built the world's first robotics computer, processing an algorithm nobody understood at the time called deep learning.

This is over 10 years ago now.

Ten years later, I can't be happier with what we've built, and the opportunity to create the next wave of AI.

More importantly, we developed agility and a culture of resilience.

Let me tell you one more story.

I used to work from one of our international sites for one month each summer.

When our kids were in their teens, we spent a summer in Japan.

Over a weekend, we visited Kyoto and the Silver Temple.

If you haven't had a chance to go, you must.

It's renowned for its exquisite moss garden.

The day we visited was quintessential Kyoto summer day, suffocatingly hot and humid, sticky.

Heat is radiating from the ground.

The air was thick, still.

Along with the other tourists, we wandered through the meticulously groomed moss garden, and I noticed the lone gardener.

Now, remember, the moss garden, this is the Silver Temple, the moss garden is gigantic.

It's about the size of this courtyard.

It has the largest collection of just about apparently every species of moss in the world, and just exquisitely maintained.

So, I walked up to him and I said, what are you doing? In his English, he said, I'm picking dead moss.

I'm taking care of my garden.

I said, but your garden is so big.

He responded, I have cared for my garden for 25 years.

I have plenty of time.

Well, that was one of the most profound learnings in my life, and it really taught me something.

This gardener has dedicated himself to his craft and doing his life's work.

When you do that, you have plenty of time.

Of all of the things that I value most about my abilities, intelligence is not top of that list.

My ability to endure pain and suffering, my ability to work on something for a very, very long period of time, my ability to handle setbacks and see the opportunity just around the corner,

I consider to be my superpowers, and I hope they're yours.

I hope you find a craft that you want to dedicate your lifetime to perfecting, to hone the skills of, and let it be your life's work.

Then lastly, prioritize your life and you will have plenty of time to do the important things.

Congratulations, class of 2024. Go get them.