Java the language was memory safe. The runtime and libraries weren’t all memory safe. The JIT’s can break memory safety. Applets had integration issues. So, what hurt Java were opportunities to go around memory safety instead of attacking that memory-safe code.

Memory-safe, system languages (eg Ada, Rust) address this by having as much as possible in memory safety with either little or zero runtime. Rust makes things safe that weren’t before. It has unsafe which is less used than some other languages. The type checker can also catch many logic-level errors. The safety situation is better with Rust than Java code.

That doesn’t mean it will solve NVIDIA users’ problems, though. They are usually worried about compatibility, performance, and reliability. Rust mostly helps in one area. We’ll see about the rest, especially compatibility, as you said.