Top 25 FinTech Angel Investors in South Korea in November 2024

Investor	FinTech South Korea investments
Pietro Dova	2
Young Song	2
Jay Eum	2
Daniel Shin	2
Naval Ravikant	2
Taekkyung Lee	2
David Lee	1
Louis Beryl	1
Michael Yang	1
Songyee Yoon	1
Do Kwon	1
Lee Dong seok	1
S Cubic Angels	1
Douglas Guen	1
Victor Wang	1
Jong-Il Yoon	1
Sungjae Hwang	1
Sunghwan Choi	1
Jung-hee Ryu	1
Richard Seongho Choi	1
Norberts Erts	1
Kiha Lee	1
Tim Draper	1
Sachin Bhanot	1
David Lee	1

Pietro Dova was Corporate Controller and Finance Director at Google from 2001 to 2007. He was partly responsible for the Google IPO and roadshow, and directed Google’s operational and transactional accounting responsibilities worldwide. Immediately prior to joining Google, Pietro was CFO of Employeeservice.com. From 1996 to 1999, Pietrowas VP Finance of Quote.com, an early online pioneer providing financial news and stock information to active investors. Pietro began his career in technology in 1988 at Oracle Corporation and held various executive finance positions through 1992. From 1993 to 1996, Pietro headed Fulcrum Technologies’ European finance operations based in Paris, France. Pietro received his undergraduate degree in Civil Engineering from Imperial College, London and his Masters in Management from M.I.T.’s Sloan School of Management.

Investment focus

Events, Ticketing, Consumer Electronics
Series A, Seed
United States, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Korbit — Korbit provides online bitcoin exchange, wallet, and merchant processor services. Kangmo Kim, Louis Jinhwa Kim, and Tony Lyu founded it on July 5, 2013, with its headquarters in Seoul in South Korea as a subsidiary of NXC as of September 26, 2017.
Pogoseat — Pogoseat provides innovative mobile ticketing solutions that helps live-entertainment venues sell more tickets and enhance the fan experience.
Bluesmart — Bluesmart develops Internet connected travel products that include physical products combined with software. It offers Bluesmart app, a solution that allows users to control suitcases from their phones, receive smart alerts, and track their travel data to get insights about travel habits. Bluesmart also provides digital lock solutions for luggageand its contents; battery charging and location tracking solutions; and distance alerts and trip data. Alejo Verlini, Brian Chen, Diego Saez-Gil, Martin Diz, and Tomi Pierucci founded it on Novermber 5, 2013, with its headquarters in Mountain View in California.

Young Song joined NComputing as Founder and CEO in 2003.Mr. Song brings over 20 years of technology vision and entrepreneurial leadership with a focus on products that deliver life-enhancing value to education, business and consumers. He has founded and operated several start-up ventures with an inherent talent and track record for turning ideasinto viable products and sustainable businesses. He is also active angel investor through his own investment vehicle, Booga Ventures and Big Basin Capital as a venture partner. He founded and currently is Chief Executive Officer of NComputing group. Prior to co-founding NComputing, Mr. Song was also the founder and CEO of DoubleSight Displays, a company that delivered affordable and cost-effective dual displays to businesses and consumers and successfully acquired by Erae Inc, TV and Monitor company in South Korea. In addition, Mr. Song co-founded and was vice president of product marketing for eMachines, a pioneer in bringing affordable computing to consumers. eMachines went NASDAQ in 3 years and acquired by Gateway Computer. He began his career as marketing director for both TriGem America Corporation and TriGem Computer, Inc.Mr. Song holds a Bachelor of Science in Electronics Engineering from Yonsei University in Seoul, Korea. He is also an active volunteer for several non-profit organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area and lives in Palo Alto with his family.

Investment focus

Travel, Software, Logistics
Angel, Seed, Funding Round
United States, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Primer — Primer (프라이머) is a startup accelerator that the partners are all entrepreneurs based in Korea. The company started Jan 2010.The company forms groups called “PrimerClub Members” by selecting potential entrepreneurs, invest seed fund and provides them with mentoring and other support services to help ensure successful outcomes in their newventures.
Airmule — Airmule Founded in 2015 and built with love in Los Angeles, California, Airmule is a trusted community marketplace for anyone to affordably express ship worldwide with a traveler from a mobile phone or tablet.Whether across the country or the world, Airmule connects people to safely deliver packages anytime, anywhere at low rates and in lesstime. Airmule is the easiest way for people list their trip to earn money with their extra luggage space.
Talkwheel — Talkwheel is where you discuss what you are passionate about in life. We are ushering in the new days of mobile conversation. Want to argue over who has the cutest pet, debate politics, or talk about the Giants during the game? Talkwheel is the app for that!Instead of tweeting and getting no response, write in Talkwheel and find fellowaficionados to have meaningful conversations around topics you care about. Unlike most mobile forums, Talkwheel believes that forums don’t have to be ugly to be functional. That’s why we’ve designed a beautiful mobile app with you, the user, as the focal point. You can even continue the conversation at your desktop at social.talkwheel.com!

Jay Eum is the Co-Founder & Managing Partner of GFT Ventures.

Investment focus

Software, Mobile, Blockchain
Seed, Series A, Series B
United States, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

boam.ai — The easy way to find your next meal. Combines your favorite review sites, restaurant platforms, and tools in one place.
Merit — A software platform for verified digital credentials for government, organizations, people, and communities.
Opaper — Bikin toko online dalam 2 menit! Terima pembayaran, pesan kurir semua disatu aplikasi memudahkan penjualan manualmu yang dari WhatsApp dan sosial media.

Daniel Shin is a renowned entrepreneur and investor, with extensive expertise and deep relationships in e-commerce. Daniel Shin is the Founder and CEO of PortOne Global, a leading payment company in Asia and beyond. The company's mission is to empower digital commerce partners across the Asian region. Through PortOne Global, Daniel Shinassists in the growth and development of partner companies and facilitates expansion.Previously, Daniel founded and was CEO of TicketMonster, Korea's leading e-commerce platform with $3.5Bin GMV. He is also a Co-Founder and board member of Fast Track Asia, a company-builder that established and sold multiple businesses including Fast Five (office sharing platform) and FoodFly (food delivery, acquired by Yogiyo).Daniel holds a B.Sc. in Economics from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Investment focus

Software, Information Technology, Internet
Seed, Angel, Series A
South Korea, United States, Malaysia

Portfolio highlights

Bering Lab — Bering Lab provides AI-powered machine translation services for the legal, IP, financial, technology, enterprise markets
Port One — Experience every payment in the world with one line of code
Korea Credit Data — • Korea Credit Data (KCD) provides business management solution to small and medium-sized businesses in Korea. KCD established a dominant position (M/S 70%+) through ‘Cashnote' and ‘Bizbot’ services used by more than 1.1 million businesses. KCD aims to resolve issues a business owner faces from the beginning to end of his business life.To this end, KCD will expand its business areas to include B2B commerce to B2C payment area.

Naval Ravikant is the CEO and a co-founder of AngelList. He previously co-founded Epinions (which went public as part of Shopping.com) and Vast.com. He is an active Angel investor, and have invested in dozens of companies, including Twitter, Uber, Yammer, Stack Overflow and Wanelo.

Investment focus

Software, FinTech, Blockchain
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
United States, India, United Kingdom

Portfolio highlights

Tako — Tako is an AI search engine that embed intelligence.
Synex Medical — Synex Medical develops non-invasive blood testing technology. This portable device will allow users to monitor metabolite concentrations without having to penetrate skin. They use a miniaturized magnetic resonance system to detect blood metabolites. The system only consists of magnets and radio waves, meaning there are no negative health effects.
Mystiko.Network — Mystiko.Network enables users to trade on private DEX just like on Uniswap while users' financial privacy is protected. Users could transfer assets to a brand new secret and ultra-safe address with full privacy. Any wallet could provide its user's such features by implementing Mystiko Wallet SDK.

Taekkyung Lee is the Founder , CEO and Representative Partner of Mashup Ventures. He previously worked at Primer Season2 as a Founding Partner. Taekkyung Lee attended Yonsei University.

Investment focus

Software, Information Technology, Management Information Systems
Seed, Angel, Funding Round
South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Soundl.ly — Soundl.ly provides IoT manufactures & app developers with the most reliable data-over-audio technology for pairing devices instantly with zero user hassle.* Our technology is 100% software, so 10 times cheaper than Bluetooth* UX becomes far simpler since the steps to turn Bluetooth ON are eliminated* Our patented technology is based onRADAR and outperforming competitors by 10xOur clients (as of Aug. '16):* Akbank TV commercials: we activated TV viewer's mobiles to send an app install link* Shopping&T: TV shopping network with 15M subscriber reach* Lotte Cinema: 30% marketshare of Korean domestic theaters
500videos Inc. — 500videos’s verified video comes with 3-point (place, people, product) verification. We visit to check actual location of business, check the business registration or real owner and shoot the real product or service.
DRAMA & COMPANY — Draman Company is a Mobile-based startup offering a cloud-based business card management application. The company was established in June 2013.

David was hired at Google in 2000 as one of the first 200 employees, and was the first executive to lead their international BD, sales, and operations. He launched Google’s first international ads and founded their offices in Asia, Europe and Latam. He hired the first intl. mgmt. teams, and established Google’s overseas business. After Google,David co-founded XG Ventures, a Google alumni fund and was Co-founding Partner of SK Telecom Ventures, a $100M corp. VC fund based in Silicon Valley. His personal and VC investments include over 50 companies with 20+ acquisitions such as Tapulous (acq. by Disney), Posterous (acq. by Twitter), Scoopler (acq. by Google), ABitLucky (acq. by Zynga), Chai Labs (acq. by Facebook), Cue (acq. by Apple), Kabam (acq. by Netmarble), Chartboost, Wish, and many others. David is an LP in Y Combinator and SV Angel. In 2015, he partnered with Michael Bay (Transformers, The Rock) at 451 Media, to lead their tech and media investments and partnerships. David later formed Open Source Studios, a Stanford Business School based advisory group with prof. and two time Oscar winner Bill Guttentag, to help founders of tech & media startups such as MasterClass and Illumix. David is also a Partner at B&C Group, a leading talent mgmt. & prod. co., connecting Korea, Hollywood and Silicon Valley. He currently invests in emerging tech & media companies through his venture capital fund SLVC.David is on the advisory boards of ASES (Stanford Entrepreneurship Society), and HPAIR (Harvard Project for Asian & Intl. Relations).BloombergBusinessweek “Google’s Real Power” flic.kr/p/7FVJgr The Hollywood Reporter: https://bit.ly/2UEQAujDecoding Silicon Valley: goo.gl/ZFAefzTechcrunch: goo.gl/9q9chzTop Angel Investors: goo.gl/4eqfbm“New Silicon Valley Stars of Korean Descent” goo.gl/ZwFCu6"[슈퍼리치]실리콘밸리 뉴 코리안 슈퍼리치" goo.gl/WBQOf0“스타트업 눈앞 이익만..." goo.gl/KB78mCSina News: bit.ly/2QaCqAc

Investment focus

Software, FinTech, Health Care
Seed, Series A, Angel
United States, Japan, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Bolt Labs — Bolt Labs provides instant private payments for everyday purchases. The company was founded in 2018 and is headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland.
Story Protocol — Powering web3 narrative universes via story legos
The Plug Drink — The Plug Drink is made with 100% natural ingredients. Bounce-back faster than ever.

3X Founder of Earnest, SolidEnergy, and now working on the next one. Formerly a16z and YC. Active angel investor and board member.

Investment focus

Software, FinTech, Financial Services
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
United States, Canada, United Kingdom

Portfolio highlights

Stelo Labs — Read the lastest on web3 security from Stelo
OnRamp — Move onboarding projects along faster by putting customers at the center of a simple, guided experience. OnRamp is the customer onboarding platform built for customer success and implementation teams.
Meez Culinary Solutions — Organize, Train, Cost, Iterate, Collaborate, and Share your recipes and process.

Michael founded users. Michael and the team successfully raised $30M in venture capital investment from investors such as Brentwood, Sprout, Intel Capital, Citigroup Venture Capital, and Transcosmos Corporation. In February of 2000, mySimon was successfully acquired by CNET for $700M.Prior to mySimon.com, Michael held positions at Xerox Corp., Intergraph Corporation, TeleVideo, Inc., Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., and Jazz Multimedia, Inc. Michael has a BS degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from UC Berkeley, MS degree in Computer Science from Columbia University and MBA degree from the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley. He has served on the advisory board of the Stanford Institute of Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) at Stanford University. Michael holds a third degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do.

Investment focus

SaaS, Bitcoin, FinTech
Seed, Series A, Series B
South Korea, United States

Portfolio highlights

Become — Become, Inc. provides cloud-based performance marketing and SaaS solutions that benefit online retailers, web & mobile publishers and online shoppers (Product Ads, Channel Management, Feed Optimization, Analytics and more). Become helps merchants increase sales, publishers monetize traffic and consumers make more informed shoppingdecisions. With over 500 publishers, Become operates the world’s largest syndication network for Product Ads.A truly global company, Become, Inc. generates over 70% of its revenue outside the US. With operations in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, France, Austria, Japan, and the Philippines, we leverage our growing global footprint to provide unmatched solutions to our partners and shoppers.Become, Inc. is a profitable, privately held company with headquarters in Sunnyvale, California. Key investors include TPG, Transcosmos, Inc., European Founders Fund and Ron Conway.
Korbit — Korbit provides online bitcoin exchange, wallet, and merchant processor services. Kangmo Kim, Louis Jinhwa Kim, and Tony Lyu founded it on July 5, 2013, with its headquarters in Seoul in South Korea as a subsidiary of NXC as of September 26, 2017.

Songyee Yoon

Investment focus

Software, Film, Hardware
Seed, Series B
United States, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

AI Spera — AI Spera provides AI driven security based on cyber threat intelligence
Together AI — Together will enable researchers, developers & companies to leverage and improve artificial intelligence with an intuitive data, models & computation platform.
Light Field Lab — Escape the Screen. We're creating a world where content escapes the screen and merges with reality.

Do Kwon is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Terraform Labs. Do Kwon is the Founder & CEO at Terraform Labs . Do Kwon attended Stanford University.

Investment focus

Blockchain, Cryptocurrency, FinTech
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
United States, Singapore, United Kingdom

Portfolio highlights

KlayCity — KlayCity is a P2E virtual world where district NFT owners can govern, explore and earn while enjoying the gaming experience.
Fractal — Fractal is an in-game asset and virtual world marketplace where users may find, purchase, and sell gaming NFTs. Fractal is headquartered in Solana, United States and was founded in 2021.
Treehouse — Explore Treehouse Protocol, a decentralized application introducing tAssets and Decentralized Offered Rates (DOR). Deposit ETH or LST to receive tETH and unify fragmented on-chain ETH rates.

Lee Dong -seok serves as Chairman at Coolidge Corner Investment.

Investment focus

Incubators, Crowdfunding, Enterprise Software
Seed
South Korea

Portfolio highlights

OpenTrade — OpenTrade (오픈트레이드) is a Korean business incubator focused on developing a communication-based crowdfunding platform for startups. Having identified lack of communication as the biggest stumbling block in attracting investments, the company has developed the platform to enable transparent communication between entrepreneurs, startups, andinvestors.OpenTrade’s crowdfunding platform enables startups to have ongoing communication with investors and thereby build a long-term relationship based on trust. OpenTrade also provides mentoring facilities in the areas of management, marketing, and finance.

S Cubic Angels

Investment focus

Education, Apps, EdTech
Seed, Angel, Pre-Seed
South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Savle — Savle is a purpose-based asset management and fun saving platform service for asset management beginners.
KRG Group — KRG Group is a rental guarantee company that offers rental management and rent deposit management services.
Turing — Reinvent Education with Technology

Douglas Guen is the CEO and Founder of Primer. He previously worked at INICIS as a Founder and CEO. Douglas Guen attended Kyungpook National University.

Investment focus

Lifestyle, Retail, E-Commerce
Seed, Angel, Pre-Seed
United States, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

WASHSWAT — Washswat is a laundry service that washes and dries the laundry that is operated by specialized facilities and personnel. They innovate the market with IT technology. Laundromat started in Gangnam with the highest number of high-end cleaners in 2015 and walked step by step silently. In order to grow in the right direction even though it is alittle slower than others, they did not rush to expand the region. Now it is Korea's No. 1 mobile laundry special service at the King of Seoul, Seongnam, Hanam, Goyang, Gwangmyeong, Yongin, Suwon, Anyang, and Gwacheon.
Soomgo — Soomgo is a local services marketplace where customers and local professionals for over 1,000+ services come together. Their services range from private music lessons and home cleaning to wedding planning and web development among many more. The company is backed by leading institutions in both South Korea and the United States including YCombinator (W17), FJ Labs, IMM, Atinum, TBT, Strong Ventures, KDB, and more.
Melixir — Melixir is a cult beauty brand rooted in Korean skincare rituals backed by science. Inspired by Eastern philosophy, Melixir believes that Nature is the purest form of beauty and creates plant-based skincare products that are 100% vegan and sustainable. Using cutting-edge technology and proprietary ingredients like Green Elixir™, Melixir designs themost innovative products for sensitive skin that deliver clinically-proven results.

Victor Wang is a Partner at HOF Capital. He attended the University of California Berkeley.

Investment focus

Artificial Intelligence, Biotechnology, Health Care
Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed
United States, Singapore, India

Portfolio highlights

Heptabase — A note-taking tool for visual learning.
Extropic AI — The next era of computing isn't dead. It's alive. More coming soon.
Dialect — Discover the fastest, most intuitive, and safest way to trade tokens over chat

Jong-Il Yoon - Venture Partner @ BonAngels Venture Partners

Investment focus

Information Technology, E-Commerce, Software
Seed, Angel, Pre-Seed
South Korea, United States, Japan

Portfolio highlights

GlucoFit — GlucoFit offers meals that induce blood sugar rises and helps to regulate blood sugar more effectively and healthily.
MyMusicTaste — MyMusicTaste is a one-stop K-Pop platform, where K-pop fans worldwide can watch their favorites' online concerts. Not only that, you can also interact with the artists during online fansigns, support them by getting their latest album and keep up to date with their latest news!
Lendit — Lendit is the leading personal loan oriented marketplace lending company in Korea that operates fully online and manages a marketplace platform where investors can provide capital to people seeking loans. Through our advanced risk ranking algorithm and cost- effective operational process, borrowers can access to an appealing interest rate andinvestors can enjoy ‘high and stable’ yield. We offer borrowers an APR between 4.5% and 18.0%, and investors an average return of 10.66%. By transforming the traditional banking system, we aim to help both borrowers and investors to achieve financial goals.

Sungjae Hwang is the Founder and CEO of Lounge Lab. He earned his doctorate and master's degree at Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology and his bachelor's degree at Kwangwoon University.

Investment focus

Art, FinTech, Peer to Peer
Pre-Seed
South Korea

Portfolio highlights

TESSA — TESSA is an alternative investment platform for the purchase, sale, and trade of fractionalized ownership interests in investment-grade blue-chip artwork (such as Warhol, Picasso, Kusama, Basquiat, etc.) with the accessibility and liquidity of public markets. The platform enables white-listed “micro-collectors” to co-own fractional ownershipinterests in curated blue-chip artwork represented in digital form on a public blockchain. TESSA manages all maintenance and administrative services relating to the artwork which is publicly promoted and displayed to enhance its value and broaden its exposure to the art-viewing public.The platform provides transparent and safe management of ownership certificates, transaction history, and transfer status through a blockchain network and secure third-party service providers.

Sunghwan Choi

Investment focus

Software, FinTech, Financial Services
Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed
United States, Hong Kong, South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Jerry — Jerry is an AI, ML, and bot-powered car ownership app that saves customers time and money on car expenses. With its first product, Jerry redesigned and disrupted the century-old car insurance process, turning stacks of pages and hours of calls into a handful of clicks. The company was founded in 2017 and is based in Palo Alto, California.
CHAI — CHAI is a mobile payments dApp that allows consumers to pay for items online by simply adding their bank account.
Sequin — Sequin is on a mission to fight the Pink Tax with cashback rewards & money education.

Jung-hee Ryu is the Partner and CEO of FuturePlay. He previously worked at FoundationX as a Partner. Jung-hee Ryu attended the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.

Investment focus

Software, Fashion, Artificial Intelligence
Seed, Angel, Pre-Seed
South Korea, United States

Portfolio highlights

Primer — Primer (프라이머) is a startup accelerator that the partners are all entrepreneurs based in Korea. The company started Jan 2010.The company forms groups called “PrimerClub Members” by selecting potential entrepreneurs, invest seed fund and provides them with mentoring and other support services to help ensure successful outcomes in their newventures.
Alcacruz — A video streaming company with offices in Silicon Valley & Seoul. AlcaCruz created CruzTV, a global esports streaming platform that live streams multiple views (esports, sports games, concerts, channel programming, etc.) into one interactive screen. Our MultiView technology is based on AlcaCruz's SuperStream which live streams 360VR/AR/MR with superb video quality and at extremely low bandwidth (70% cost savings over conventional VR streaming).
Soundl.ly — Soundl.ly provides IoT manufactures & app developers with the most reliable data-over-audio technology for pairing devices instantly with zero user hassle.* Our technology is 100% software, so 10 times cheaper than Bluetooth* UX becomes far simpler since the steps to turn Bluetooth ON are eliminated* Our patented technology is based onRADAR and outperforming competitors by 10xOur clients (as of Aug. '16):* Akbank TV commercials: we activated TV viewer's mobiles to send an app install link* Shopping&T: TV shopping network with 15M subscriber reach* Lotte Cinema: 30% marketshare of Korean domestic theaters

Richard Seongho Choi

Investment focus

SaaS, Software, Human Resources
Seed
South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Weperson — Weperson develops and operates a human resources software as a service platform.
Time Percent — Time Percent is a trading platform that integrates virtual assets, domestic stocks, and foreign stocks.

Norberts Erts is the Product Marketing Manager at Sage.

Investment focus

Rental, Retail, Leasing
Seed
South Korea

Portfolio highlights

Value Space Co. — Value Space Co. is a space reconstruction company that offers space-optimized services through project development planning.

Kiha Lee is the Founding Partner of Primer Sazze Partners. He previously worked at Sazze Partners as a Managing Partner. Kiha Lee attended the University of California Berkeley.

Investment focus

Apps, Sales, Artificial Intelligence
Seed, Series A, Angel
South Korea, United States, Japan

Portfolio highlights

BIGC — BIGC is a technology company that offers digital marketing, content creation, and advertising services.
Primer — Primer (프라이머) is a startup accelerator that the partners are all entrepreneurs based in Korea. The company started Jan 2010.The company forms groups called “PrimerClub Members” by selecting potential entrepreneurs, invest seed fund and provides them with mentoring and other support services to help ensure successful outcomes in their newventures.
MakeDashy — Maximize repeat purchases with targeted user segmentation and dynamic product recommendation at Retentics, powered by AI

Tim Draper is the Founding Partner of Draper Associates. He attended Harvard Business School.

Investment focus

Software, FinTech, Financial Services
Seed, Series A, Series B
United States, United Kingdom, Canada

Portfolio highlights

GALY — Saving Our Planet by Transitioning the World to Cellular Agriculture
Buupass — BuuPass is Kenya's market leader for online bus booking. We enable travelers to reserve seats and make payments in a convenient and timely way. Try BuuPass today!
Zest Protocol — Zest Protocol enables users to put their Bitcoin to work. Earn more BTC, or borrow against your BTC.

Sachin Bhanot serves as the Head of Investments at Prosus Ventures.

Investment focus

Financial Services, SaaS, FinTech
Series A, Seed, Funding Round
Australia, Singapore, Indonesia

Portfolio highlights

Neara — Predictive modeling software for proactive network governance. Quantify and prove network needs in any scenario. Run precise analyses in hours and days instead of months or years in the field.
Quotabook — Quotabook is a company that specializes in equity management.
FiberSense — FiberSense is providing cities and critical infrastructure operators with game changing real-time detection of objects and events.

David was hired at Google in 2000 as one of the first 200 employees, and was the first executive to lead their international BD, sales, and operations. He launched Google’s first international ads and founded their offices in Asia, Europe and Latam. He hired the first intl. mgmt. teams, and established Google’s overseas business. After Google,David co-founded XG Ventures, a Google alumni fund and was Co-founding Partner of SK Telecom Ventures, a $100M corp. VC fund based in Silicon Valley. His personal and VC investments include over 50 companies with 20+ acquisitions such as Tapulous (acq. by Disney), Posterous (acq. by Twitter), Scoopler (acq. by Google), ABitLucky (acq. by Zynga), Chai Labs (acq. by Facebook), Cue (acq. by Apple), Kabam (acq. by Netmarble), Chartboost, Wish, and many others. David is an LP in Y Combinator and SV Angel. In 2015, he partnered with Michael Bay (Transformers, The Rock) at 451 Media, to lead their tech and media investments and partnerships. David later formed Open Source Studios, a Stanford Business School based advisory group with prof. and two time Oscar winner Bill Guttentag, to help founders of tech & media startups such as MasterClass and Illumix. David is also a Partner at B&C Group, a leading talent mgmt. & prod. co., connecting Korea, Hollywood and Silicon Valley. He currently invests in emerging tech & media companies through his venture capital fund SLVC.David is on the advisory boards of ASES (Stanford Entrepreneurship Society), and HPAIR (Harvard Project for Asian & Intl. Relations).BloombergBusinessweek “Google’s Real Power” flic.kr/p/7FVJgr The Hollywood Reporter: https://bit.ly/2UEQAujDecoding Silicon Valley: goo.gl/ZFAefzTechcrunch: goo.gl/9q9chzTop Angel Investors: goo.gl/4eqfbm“New Silicon Valley Stars of Korean Descent” goo.gl/ZwFCu6"[슈퍼리치]실리콘밸리 뉴 코리안 슈퍼리치" goo.gl/WBQOf0“스타트업 눈앞 이익만..." goo.gl/KB78mCSina News: bit.ly/2QaCqAc

Investment focus

Software, Health Care, FinTech
Seed, Series A, Funding Round
United States, South Korea, United Kingdom

Portfolio highlights

Bolt Labs — Bolt Labs provides instant private payments for everyday purchases. The company was founded in 2018 and is headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland.
Story Protocol — Powering web3 narrative universes via story legos
The Plug Drink — The Plug Drink is made with 100% natural ingredients. Bounce-back faster than ever.