Kkanbu Chicken is a popular destination for hungry folks in Seoul, South Korea. Specializing in fried chicken and beer, it's about as blue collar as you can get, cuisine-wise. But on Thursday, three billionaires decided to stop in for a bite.
Nvidia's CEO dined with the chairmen of Samsung Electronics and Hyundai Motor Group; then the trio began handing out food to the crowd outside
ADEK BERRY
Kkanbu Chicken is a popular destination for hungry folks in Seoul, South Korea. Specializing in fried chicken and beer, it's about as blue collar as you can get, cuisine-wise. But on Thursday, three billionaires decided to stop in for a bite.
The trio enjoyed "chimaek" (the fried chicken and beer combo) as well as cheese balls, cheese sticks, and boneless chicken according to national news agency Yonhap. And in a country where business leaders generally guard their privacy, the trio drew a crowd of onlookers that numbered in the hundreds.
After linking their arms to take a shot of beer (a gesture symbolizing friendship in South Korea), the three executives stepped out and offered chicken and cheese sticks to the onlookers. Afterward Huang, whose company is worth $5 trillion, rang the restaurant's "golden bell," signifying they would be paying everyone's bill. (Yonhap reported it was actually Samsung’s Lee who picked up the tab, though. Chung paid for a second round.)
It's far from the first time Huang has handed out food to people. At Nvidia's GTC AI conference in March, he handed out "Nvidia Breakfast Bytes," a limited-time menu item from Denny's, to attendees.
Huang worked at Denny's as a teenager, waiting tables, which he credits for helping him learn how to communicate with people he didn’t know and find compromise when things get tense. And when he was founding the company, he and his cofounders would meet in the booth of a bullet-ridden Denny’s near San Jose, Calif., not far from his home.
“We were not good customers,” Malachowsky told the Journal. “We were going to show up for four hours and drink 10 cups of coffee.”
Eventually, the trio was asked to move to a room in the back, where police were often found working on their reports. Once they noticed the bullet holes in the front window, though, the founders agreed to find a different place to make their plans.
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