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Most of the world\u2019s top corporations have simple names. Steve Jobs named<\/a> Apple<\/a> while on a fruitarian diet, and found the name \u201cfun, spirited and not intimidating.\u201d Plus, it came before Atari in the phonebook. Microsoft<\/a> is an amalgamation<\/a> of the words \u201cmicrocomputer\u201d and \u201csoftware,\u201d while Walmart<\/a> a combination of the last name of the superstore\u2019s founder, Sam Walton, and \u201cmart.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Nvidia\u2014which briefly held the title of the most valuable company in the world<\/a> this past week\u2014challenges these simple branding conventions. The consonant-ridden name and eerie, 1990s-esque<\/a> op-art<\/a> logo recall its underdog, start-up roots rather than its current reality: a behemoth cornering the AI chips market.\u00a0<\/p>\n Regardless of its unconventionality, Nvidia\u2019s prominence demands conversation, and conversation demands pronunciation. So, what is the correct way to pronounce Nvidia?\u00a0<\/p>\n According to its website<\/a>, Nvidia is pronounced \u201cen-VID-eeyah,\u201d not NUH-vid-eeyah, as many have called it.\u00a0<\/p>\n Where did the \u2018Nvidia\u2019 name come from?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n When Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang started the company with his friends Chris Malachowsky and Curtis Priem in 1993, they hashed out almost every detail of their new business, except for the name. Sitting in a Palo Alto Denny\u2019s<\/a>\u2014a venue chosen for its cheap coffee and for Huang\u2019s experience working there in his youth\u2014the three cofounders drew blanks for the title of their venture.\u00a0<\/p>\n So, as they continued building, they simply named their files \u201cNV\u201d for next version, Huang previously<\/a> told Fortune. <\/em>When time came to incorporate the company, the three were forced to find a name. At first, they chose NVision, until they learned<\/a> that a toilet paper manufacturer already took the name. <\/p>\n After going back to the drawing board, the cofounders scraped through all words with \u201cNV\u201d in them, until Huang suggested Nvidia, riffing on the Latin word invidia, <\/em>meaning \u201cenvy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The name worked because the three had hopes to design such a powerful graphics chip that it would make competitors, as Priem previously told The New Yorker, <\/em>\u201cgreen with envy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The First \u2018Nvidia<\/strong>\u2018<\/p>\n The first \u201cNvidia\u201d was Invidia, the Roman goddess of envy. Her heart was \u201cgreen with bile,\u201d her tongue dripped poison, she had a \u201cpallor smeared across her face, her entire body is gaunt, her eyesight squints at everything,\u201d as the Roman poet Ovid describes her in the Metamorphosis<\/em><\/a>.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Company branding doesn\u2019t ofter draw from Roman mythology, much less from a figure so unseemly. And yet, the envy motif appears to be littered throughout the company\u2019s products. The eighth generation of its graphics processing units had the slogan \u201cgreen with envy.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Nvidia\u2019s logo, a green, spiraling eye, may have also drawn inspiration from the first Invidia. Her figure was associated with a piercing gaze, an \u201cevil eye\u201d that casts a curse upon those she envies. People of many religions still wear<\/a> \u201cevil eye\u201d amulets, or recite prayers, to ward off the curse.\u00a0<\/p>\n Many companies now have reason to be jealous of Nvidia. With a market cap of $3.1 trillion,<\/a> unprecedented market concentration and seemingly limitless growth, Nvidia\u2019s success is what every CEO dreams of. <\/p>\n Huang may have foreseen this, and intentionally placed envy at the forefront as a reminder of his competitors clawing at him. According to The<\/em> New Yorker, <\/em>for years Huang opened every staff meeting with the words, \u201cour company is 30 days from going out of business.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Apparently, even after all the success, the phrase remains the unofficial corporate motto.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\nSubscribe to the Fortune Next to Lead newsletter to get weekly strategies on how to make it to the corner office. Sign up for free<\/a> before it launches on June 24, 2024.<\/div>\n