Tuff Yen
CEO @ Seraph Group
San Francisco, United States
Tuff Yen is a seed investor at Seraph Group in San Francisco focused on Health Care and Software. Tuff Yen is the CEO of Seraph Group, a professionally managed angel investment fund group that invests in seed and early stage private enterprises by leveraging its proprietary network of more than 300 successful business leaders and entrepreneurs. Yen spent his career as a scientist and a professional investor. He worked as a venture capitalist with Hambrecht & Quist's venture fund ("HQAP") in San Francisco as well as Chemical Bank’s venture arm in New York City. During this period, he worked on investments in a broad range of businesses including industrial manufacturing, distribution, entertainment, publishing, information technology, Internet, medical and life sciences. Prior to joining the VC community, Yen was a bioengineer with Genentech and worked at Amgen, two leading biotechnology pioneers. He received his Masters in Business Administration from the Yale School of Management and his Bachelor degree in Arts in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of California Berkeley.
- Total investments:
- 11
- Last investment:
- Lead investor:
- 0%
Last updated:
For AI agents: llms.txt
Industries Tuff Yen invests in
Stages Tuff Yen invests in
Countries Tuff Yen invests in
Contacts
| Type | Contact | Validation |
|---|---|---|
| Work email | ||
| Personal email | ||
| Work phone | ||
| Personal phone | ||
| Socials |
Investment Focus
Industry
- Health Care 3 (27%)
- Software 2 (18%)
- News 1 (9%)
- AgTech 1 (9%)
- Drones 1 (9%)
Stage
- Seed 3 (27%)
- Series A 2 (18%)
- Series B 2 (18%)
- Angel 1 (9%)
- Pre-Seed 1 (9%)
Country
- United States 8 (73%)
- New Zealand 1 (9%)
Investments
| Company | Description | Round | Links |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hubble Network is a developer of a satellite-powered Bluetooth network that enables devices to connect regardless of cellular reception. | $70M / Series B / Sep 17, 2025 | ||
| Cropsy's mission is to deliver disruptive, scalable technology to every fruit grower to unlock the full potential of their land with insights that were impossible before. Our proprietary AI-enabled hardware allows growers to monitor every plant, understand the whole crop, and track how it changes over time. These insights help growers optimiseall their decision making. The system is a simple tractor add-on, so growers do all their daily operations while Cropsy looks out for problems. Cropsy is poised to set the new gold standard for growing, with recommendations, forecasts, and providing certainty to every grower, every season. | $1M / Seed / Oct 04, 2023 | ||
| LiteraSeed has developed a clinically validated digital health platform that enables providers to better understand health status in low health literate patient populations, preventing costly misdiagnoses, adverse events, and ER admissions. | $110K / Pre-Seed / Sep 01, 2020 | ||
| Zeto is a commercial stage medical technology startup transforming the way EEG (Electroencephalography) is done at hospitals. We are solving a problem unsolved since EEG was invented in 1924, i.e., an archaic, tedious approach that consumes time, requires a trained technician and puts the patient through a poor experience.Our product is the firstFDA cleared wireless, zero-prep, easy-to-wear headset with dry electrodes. The device is backed by a digital platform that offers instant upload, tools for analysis, and remote interpretation by neurologists. A process that takes over 30 mins by a technician just to set up will instead take just 5 minutes from putting on the headset to interpretable EEG.Zeto has won several awards including $350,000 from the Epilepsy Foundation, 2018 MedTech Innovator Showcase company, 2018 Exponential Medicine MEDY Outstanding Pitch Award, 2017 Rosenman Innovator by UCSF's QB3. | $7M / Series A / Feb 01, 2020 | ||
| Syntiant is moving artificial intelligence and machine learning from the cloud to edge devices. Syntiant’s advanced chip solutions merge deep learning with semiconductor design to produce ultra-low-power, high performance, deep neural network processors for always-on applications in battery-powered devices, such as smartphones, smart speakers,earbuds, hearing aids, and laptops. | Series B / Oct 01, 2018 | ||
| Natilus is a large scale drone manufacturing company. The company specializes in the manufacturing of Boeing 747 sized drones which provides inter-continental cargo delivery services and helps in reducing air freight costs. Natilus was founded by LZ Zhang, Anatoly Starikov and Aleksey Matyushev in 2016.First flight of their 2200 lbs / 30 ftdrone is scheduled for Summer 2018. At the end of 2018, Natilus completed a flight test of their 2200 lbs prototype.The first production vehicle scheduled for 2020 customer delivery underwent wind tunnel testing in April, 2019. Natilus currently holds an aircraft order book rumored to be in excess of $1B+. | Seed / Nov 13, 2017 | ||
| Syntiant is moving artificial intelligence and machine learning from the cloud to edge devices. Syntiant’s advanced chip solutions merge deep learning with semiconductor design to produce ultra-low-power, high performance, deep neural network processors for always-on applications in battery-powered devices, such as smartphones, smart speakers,earbuds, hearing aids, and laptops. | Series A / Oct 01, 2017 | ||
| AreaMetrics was acquired by Point Inside in January 2020. AreaMetrics provides geo-location data that powers insights for marketers and brands. We access a network of in-store sensors to understand offline foot-traffic and to deliver the highest-quality in alternative data intelligence. | $225K / Angel / Feb 01, 2014 | ||
| Primeloop makes it easy to track your press, and receive notifications about new comments, shares and engagement on all your PR clippings. | $300K / Seed / Jan 24, 2014 | ||
| Rallyon scales health for the enterprise.Companies use our platform to deliver health and wellness programs to their employees, allowing them to build healthier populations and in return, lower their healthcare costs.Rallyon’s new approach to motivating employees solves the 2 biggest challenges companies have: few employees participate inthese programs, and when they do, fewer see results. | $1.5M / Jun 17, 2011 | ||
| See all 11 investments → | |||
Co-Investors
About Seraph Group
It all began in 2003, with a conversation outlining the inefficiencies in Angel investing in addition to the difficulties entrepreneurs face while raising start-up capital. Few investment groups specialize in investing $50k to $2 million in early-stage companies and even fewer bring a broad value-add network to support entrepreneurs. The Seraph Investor Network was founded with the vision of providing capital and support in an expedient and efficient manner without geographic prejudice. Our Investor Network reaches 91+ cities and spans three continents. The reach provides valuable expertise to entrepreneurs and investors. Seraph Group is comprised of a diverse group of business leaders, entrepreneurs, and technology leaders across wide array of different industries. By leveraging this expertise, Seraph Group is able to evaluate and invest in venture scalable opportunities across most industries. Investments range from $50K to $1.5 million and can participate along any financing stage of the company. While Seraph Group is comprised solely of angel investors, the investment process mimics a traditional venture capital firm where there is a fund managed by a small investment team. This pool of smart capital brings singular access to a prestigious group of individuals that are all invested in an entrepreneur's business and its success. In today' market, companies have proven that only a relatively small amount of capital infusion, under $1 million, is enough to build a venture scalable business. However, most entrepreneurs will attest, that raising $500K to $1.5 million, is the hardest amount of capital to raise because it is too small for traditional venture firms. Seraph Group's focus is to fill this unmet need in the market for professional, smart capital. The primary investment criteria for companies raising money is for it to be a venture-scalable business and not a life-style business. Seraph Group will consider investing in any round of financing and has often invested alongside later-stage venture firms.
Seraph Group Contacts
| Name | Phone | Socials | |
|---|---|---|---|
Peter Truwit
Partner
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Stephen Fleming
Investment Committee
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Tuff Yen
CEO
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Charles Ralston
Principal
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Jake Moilanen
General Partner
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FAQ
What does Tuff Yen invest in?
Tuff Yen invests primarily in Health Care, Software and News startups, most often at Seed and Series A stage. Most of the 11 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 Tuff Yen?
Public channels for Tuff Yen include LinkedIn. 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.
When did Tuff Yen last invest?
The most recent investment recorded for Tuff Yen closed in Sep 2025. Shizune tracks 11 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.
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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