11, 2009. The tender offer applied to outstanding stock options held by employees with an exercise price equal to or greater than $17.50 per share. None of the non-employee members of our Board of Directors or our officers who file reports under Section 16(a) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, including our former Chief Financial Officer, Marvin D. Burkett, were eligible to participate in the Offer. All eligible options with exercise prices less than $28.00 per share, but not less than $17.50 per share were eligible to receive a cash payment of $3.00 per option in exchange for the cancellation of the eligible option. All eligible options with exercise prices greater than $28.00 per share were eligible to receive a cash payment of $2.00 per option in exchange for the cancellation of the eligible option. Please refer to Note 19 for further discussion regarding the cash tender offer for certain employee stock options that our Board of Directors approved in February 2009.

 

    Stock Repurchase Program

 

    During fiscal year 2005, we announced that our Board of Directors, or Board, had authorized a stock repurchase program to repurchase shares of our common stock, subject to certain specifications, up to an aggregate maximum amount of $300 million.  During fiscal year 2007, the Board further approved an increase of $400 million to the original stock repurchase program. In fiscal year 2008, we announced a stock repurchase program under which we may purchase up to an additional $1.0 billion of our common stock over a three year period through May 2010. On August 12, 2008, we announced that our Board further authorized an additional increase of $1.0 billion to the stock repurchase program. As a result of these increases, we have an ongoing authorization from the Board, subject to certain specifications, to repurchase shares of our common stock up to an aggregate maximum amount of $2.7 billion through May 2010. 

 

    The repurchases will be made from time to time in the open market, in privately negotiated transactions, or in structured stock repurchase programs, and may be made in one or more larger repurchases, in compliance with the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, or the Exchange Act, Rule 10b-18, subject to market conditions, applicable legal requirements, and other factors. The program does not obligate NVIDIA to acquire any particular amount of common stock and the program may be suspended at any time at our discretion. As part of our share repurchase program, we have entered into, and we may continue to enter into, structured share repurchase transactions with financial institutions. These agreements generally require that we make an up-front payment in exchange for the right to receive a fixed number of shares of our common stock upon execution of the agreement, and a potential incremental number of shares of our common stock, within a pre-determined range, at the end of the term of the agreement.



    During the three months ended January 25, 2009, we did not enter into any structured share repurchase transactions or otherwise purchase any shares of our common stock. During fiscal year 2009, we entered into structured share