Ivan Zhou

Partner

2024 - Current

Leading seed and series A investments in product-oriented, early-stage teams focused on building consumer and enterprise applications.

Board Member

2024

Advisor

2022

Advisor & Angel Investor

2018 - 2024

Supporting founders and their companies at the earliest stages. Like to be the first check in when possible. Investor in AfterHour, Alt, Beacons.ai, Bento, Bokksu, BuildSpace, Campfire, Captain.tv, Coinbooks, Coinshift, Copilot, Curiosity Research, Dang Foods, Decagon AI, Eclipse Labs, Elsewhere, Encuadrado, Fal.ai, Fast Break Labs, Infina, IronPlans (Acq. Silo), Jo, Karat, Kino, Landed, Paper.xyz, Lowkey (Acq. Niantic), LiquiFi, Ludio, Magic.link, Maverick, Mojo, Moonpay, Neverland, Ninja Delivery, Pahdo Labs, Peak, Ping.gg, Playbook, Poparazzi, Prune, Quanta, Rascal Games, Rex, Rize Labs, Roame, Scapin' Labs, Savvy, Series Financial, Sherlock, Syndicate, Uberduck, Winter, and more. LP in Afore Capital, Exponent, Hyphen Capital, Slope.agency, Weekend Fund and more.

Advisor

2023 - 2024

Director of Product Management

2020 - 2024

Joined Niantic in December 2020 with the acquisition of my company, Mayhem. Led the product organization responsible for empowering our developers to create world class AR experiences and helping our community discover and engage with the ecosystem of Niantic content. My groups include our Game Platform, Shared Platform Services, Data (ML & data engineering), and Social product areas at Niantic. I also work closely with our Niantic Ventures and Corporate Development team to identify and champion strategic partnerships, investments, and acquisitions.

CEO and Co-founder

2017 - 2020

Built real-time products for millions of everyday gamers. Acquired by Niantic in 2020 Raised $5.7M from Accel, Y Combinator (W18), Afore Capital, Nextgen Venture Partners, Kevin Lin, Paul Buchheit, Aditya Agarwal, Ruchi Sanghvi, and others.

Venture Partner

2017 - 2020

NextGen Venture Partners is a network-driven venture firm that brings together hundreds of part-time venture capitalists who invest in and support our portfolio of exceptional entrepreneurs

CEO and Co-Founder

2015 - 2017

Co-founded one of the earliest companies to offer on-demand, home sharing insurance with members in over 30 states across the US. Bootstrapped and scaled the company to over six figures in revenue before selling a majority stake in 2017.

Analyst

2015 - 2016

Investing in TMT companies @ multi-billion dollar, fundamental long/short equity hedge fund Focused on hardtech: AI/ML, autonomy, hyperscale datacenters, semi/semicap, smartphone supply chain, enterprise HW, communication equipment, alternative energy.