Employee Stock Option Fund
VC Fund
San Mateo, United States
Employee Stock Option Fund is a VC fund in San Mateo focused on Software and SaaS. The Employee Stock Option Fund provides current and former employees of venture-backed companies with financial help needed to exercise options and cover associated taxes. It has a due diligence strategy and transaction protocol to evaluate and close transactions very quickly.The ESO Fund provides a new approach to exercising stock options thatprovides superior ROI potential through leverage and tax optimization. The fund also provides individuals who have already exercised private stock options with partial liquidity on the same terms that allows the owners to recover capital and eliminate downside risk while still retaining the potential upside from the stock. ESO Fund was formed by Stephen Roberts, Jimmy Lackie, and Scott Chou in 2012.
- Total investments:
- 301
- Last investment:
- Lead investor:
- 0%
- Fund size:
- $3.1M
- Last fund:
Last updated:
For AI agents: llms.txt
Industries Employee Stock Option Fund invests in
Stages Employee Stock Option Fund invests in
Countries Employee Stock Option Fund invests in
Contacts
| Name | Phone | Socials | |
|---|---|---|---|
Scott Chou
|
|||
| See all 11 contacts → | |||
Investment Focus
Industry
- Software 100 (33%)
- SaaS 61 (20%)
- Enterprise Software 58 (19%)
- Information Technology 39 (13%)
- E-Commerce 32 (11%)
Stage
- Secondary Market 119 (40%)
- Venture - Series Unknown 34 (11%)
- Series C 27 (9%)
- Series D 26 (9%)
- Series E 20 (7%)
Country
- United States 283 (94%)
- Canada 4 (1%)
- Australia 2 (1%)
- United Kingdom 2 (1%)
- France 1 (0%)
Team
| Name | Title | Investments | Links | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Bill Yu
Partner and Early Investor
|
Partner and Early Investor | Total investments: 8 | Find email | |
Ken Goldman
Partner and Sr Client Specialist
|
Partner and Sr Client Specialist | Total investments: 6 | Find email | |
|
Scott Chou
Co-Founder and Managing Partner
|
Co-Founder and Managing Partner | Total investments: 33 | Find email | |
James D. Lackie
Co-Founder and Managing partner
|
Co-Founder and Managing partner | Total investments: 0 | Find email | |
Jimmy Lackie
Co-Founder and Managing partner
|
Co-Founder and Managing partner | Total investments: 0 | Find email | |
| See all 11 team members → | ||||
Investments
| Company | Description | Round | Links |
|---|---|---|---|
| Factory functions within integrated development environments, command line interfaces, and continuous integration pipelines. The technology allows for the delegation of technical tasks, including code refactors, system migrations, and incident responses. These digital agents also perform automated code reviews and facilitate the maintenance ofbuilds during the development process. Integration extends to communication platforms and project management software, allowing users to trigger actions from various interfaces. The system supports the parallelization of agents to manage software updates and maintenance across multiple operating systems. | $50M / Series B / Sep 25, 2025 | ||
| Lightmatter uses light to create photonic compute chips specialized for AI.Untethered from the limits of Moore’s Law and Dennard Scaling, they’ve rewritten the rules of processor performance scaling by combining electronics, photonics, and new algorithms to create a next-generation computing platform purpose-built for artificial intelligence.Lightmatter is building the engines that will power discoveries, drive progress, and reduce our impact on the planet. | Series D / Sep 22, 2025 | ||
| Nozomi Networks offers a cybersecurity platform that protects operational technology (OT), Internet of Things (IoT), and cyber‑physical systems through unified visibility, threat detection, and automated remediation. Nozomi Networks delivers network and endpoint monitoring via sensors such as Guardian (passive OT/IoT network visibility), Arcendpoint agents, and Guardian Air for wireless spectrum insight. It supports data collection in both cloud and on‑prem environments via Vantage and Central Management Console. Advanced analysis tools—Asset Intelligence, Threat Intelligence, Smart Polling, and Vantage IQ—apply AI to classify devices, prioritize vulnerabilities, detect anomalies, and support guided remediation workflows. | Private Equity / Jul 30, 2025 | ||
| Armis provides an agentless cybersecurity platform that identifies, monitors, and protects managed, unmanaged, and IoT devices across enterprise environments. The platform continuously discovers assets connected to a network, assesses their risk, and detects threats in real time. It integrates with existing security tools to provide visibility andcontrol over devices without disrupting business operations. Armis uses behavioral analysis and contextual intelligence to detect anomalies and potential security incidents across IT, operational technology, and medical environments. Its platform is designed to support organizations in sectors such as healthcare, manufacturing, and retail by enabling automated responses to potential threats. Armis also helps enterprises maintain compliance with industry standards and reduce risks associated with shadow IT and unauthorized device access. | $100M / Secondary Market / Jul 23, 2025 | ||
| Braze is a comprehensive customer engagement platform that powers relevant and memorable experiences between consumers and the brands they love. Context underpins every Braze interaction, helping brands foster human connection with consumers through interactive conversations across channels that deliver value quickly and continuously. The companywas named a Leader in the 2019 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Mobile Marketing Platforms and was recognized as one of Inc Magazine's 2019 Best Workplaces. Braze is headquartered in New York with offices in Chicago, London, San Francisco, and Singapore. Learn more at braze.com. | $139.2M / Post-IPO Equity / Apr 10, 2025 | ||
| CISO Global is an industry leader in Managed Cybersecurity and Compliance (MCCP) services with its exclusive MCCP+ managed cybersecurity and compliance services plus culture program. The company seeks to expand by acquiring world-class cybersecurity talent and utilizes the latest technology to create innovative solutions that protect the mostdemanding businesses and government organizations against continuing and emerging security threats. | $6.5M / Post-IPO Debt / Dec 16, 2024 | ||
| Sana Labs is the global leader in the development and application of artificial intelligence to learning. We partner with the world’s leading organizations to transform learning outcomes with personalized learning.The interdisciplinary teams consist of experienced engineers and scientists with backgrounds ranging from Google AI and Spotify toImperial College and BCG Gamma. | $55M / Series C / Oct 30, 2024 | ||
| Wiz is a cloud security platform that enables organizations to enhance collaboration among security, development, and DevOps teams while facilitating a self-service model for managing cloud infrastructure and identifying potential risks. The platform provides comprehensive visibility across cloud environments, allowing users to detectvulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and compliance issues in real-time. By integrating seamlessly with existing workflows and tools, Wiz supports automated security assessments and prioritizes remediation efforts based on risk levels, helping teams to maintain security without hindering development speed. Additionally, Wiz offers insights into cloud usage patterns and security posture, empowering organizations to make informed decisions regarding their cloud strategy. | $1B / Series E / May 07, 2024 | ||
| The We Company is a platform for creators that transforms buildings into dynamic environments for creativity, focus, and collaboration. The company transform buildings into beautiful, collaborative workspaces and provide infrastructure, services, events, and tech so their members can focus on doing what they love.The We Company is formerly knownas "WeWork". It was established in 2018 and is headquartered in New York. | $450M / Post-IPO Equity / Apr 29, 2024 | ||
| Metronome helps software companies launch, iterate, and scale their business models, with billing infrastructure that works at any size and stage. Metronome prioritizes rapid deployment, flexibility, and user-friendliness, minimizing the usual engineering demands associated with billing. It empowers business and product teams to take full controlof revenue and pricing. After the initial platform integration, teams can promptly introduce new products and pricing, simplify revenue workflows, and provide customers with immediate insight into their spending. | $43M / Series B / Jan 31, 2024 | ||
| See all 301 investments → | |||
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FAQ
What does Employee Stock Option Fund invest in?
Employee Stock Option Fund invests primarily in Software, SaaS and Enterprise Software startups, most often at Secondary Market and Venture - Series Unknown stage. Most of the 301 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.
How do I contact Employee Stock Option Fund?
Public channels for Employee Stock Option Fund include LinkedIn, X (Twitter) and the website linked on this profile. For a verified work email and phone number, create a free Shizune account — contact data is searched across 20+ sources and validated before delivery, so your outreach lands in the right inbox.
Who are the partners at Employee Stock Option Fund?
The team at Employee Stock Option Fund includes Bill Yu (Partner and Early Investor), Ken Goldman (Partner and Sr Client Specialist) and Scott Chou (Co-Founder and Managing Partner), among 11 team members tracked by Shizune. The Team section lists each member with their title, investment count and links.
Is Shizune's investor data accurate?
Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Oct 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.
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