Top 5 Payments Angel Investors in South Korea (June 2026)

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

Industry: Events, Mobile, Sports
Stage:Series A, Seed
Geography: United States, South Korea

Investor stats

Total investments: 5
Round size: Seed $400k–$800k; Series A $3M–$12M
Lead/follow: 0% lead, 100% follow

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.

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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

Industry: Software, FinTech, Health Care
Stage:Seed, Series A, Angel
Geography: United States, Japan, South Korea

Investor stats

Total investments: 20
Round size: Seed $245k–$2.6M; Angel $1.7M–$10M; Series A $2M–$25M
Lead/follow: 0% lead, 100% follow

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 — Story is AI-native infrastructure for the intellectual property economy.
The Plug Drink — The Plug Drink is made with 100% natural ingredients. Bounce-back faster than ever.

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

Investment focus

Industry: Biotechnology, Artificial Intelligence, Health Care
Stage:Seed, Series A, Pre-Seed
Geography: United States, Singapore, India

Investor stats

Total investments: 27
Round size: Seed $150k–$14M; Pre-Seed $385k–$385k; Series A $10M–$26M
Lead/follow: 19% lead, 81% follow

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

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Sunghwan Choi

Investment focus

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

Investor stats

Total investments: 14
Round size: Series A $5.6M–$9M
Lead/follow: 0% lead, 100% follow

Portfolio highlights

Jerry — Jerry simplifies the expensive, frustrating, and time-consuming aspects of car ownership.
CHAI — CHAI is a mobile payments dApp that allows consumers to pay for items online by simply adding their bank account.
Sequin — Sequin is building a suite of credit products for women, starting with a debit card that builds credit.

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