Yuechen
Zhao
About
Before venture, I spent years building things. I was an engineer at Flipboard and Microsoft, a PM at Google and Uber, and briefly a founder. That background shapes how I show up: I'm most useful on the day-to-day decisions that don't make it into board decks—hiring, fundraising, GTM, product direction.
I joined what is now Informed Ventures in 2018 and have invested in over a dozen companies at the Seed stage, often before there's meaningful revenue. If you're building something interesting, I'd love to hear from you.
What I
look for
look for
- Founders who are domain experts, or who've built unusually deep relationships in a specific industry
- A clear "why now"—a regulatory, technological, or behavioral shift that makes this the right moment
- A business model with a credible path to strong unit economics
Portfolio
Plus AI
Autonomous long-haul trucking
Firework
Shoppable video and AI for e-commerce
Venteur
Reimagining health benefits administration
Akia
AI agents for hospitality
Andy AI
AI automation for home health back-office
GigSafe
Workforce management for the gig economy
Glimpse
AI agents for brand product placement
Elsewhere
Hobbies
- Coding for fun
- Hosting short-term rentals in Arizona and Tennessee
- Long conversations with Sunny