About

In Pursuit of Living a Purpose Driven Life

 

I’m a Partner at 500 Startups and also the Founder and General Partner of 500 Startups Korea, the Korean market focused arm of 500 Startups, focused on helping Korean companies compete at a global scale. I’ve been at 500S since 2013. Since then, I’ve led investments into several fast growing companies in US and Korea including Lottery.com, Famebit (acq’d by Google), Rachio, Dano, OP.GG, Spoon, and PeopleFund. I invest into ~10 companies a year between Seed and Pre-Series A stage in both US and Korea.

Prior to 500 Startups, I founded a couple of startups – both bootstrapped and venture backed – including PostRocket, a social marketing software backed by 500 Startups (which folded without any soft landing after 4 years) – and before that, I was an Associate of Romulus Capital – an early stage VC firm based in Boston.

I attended Babson College for two years before dropping out to pursue startups and investing full-time. My entrepreneurial work since a young age led me to being named one of the Youth Entrepreneurs of the Year in 2009 by NFIB and the McKelvey Foundation, snagging the top scholarship prize. On the investment side, I was one of the youngest VCs in the world at the age of 19 as an Associate at Romulus Capital and subsequently, became one of the youngest General Partners at the age of 23 when I founded 500 Startups Korea. In 2016, I was named to the inaugural Forbes Asia “30 Under 30” for Finance and Venture Capital.

Nowadays, I spend most of my time in Seoul, but still frequently make it back out to SV – along with other regions. I couldn’t be more fulfilled to be able to continue making inroads to do my part in helping Seoul become a global powerhouse of tech startups.