Evolving for the Next Billion

Join GGV 996’s anniversary party in San Francisco on Friday, March 8! The event will take the form of a Trivia Night on Chinese tech. Come test your knowledge of China's tech industry, compete to win prizes, and enjoy a great night with friends. RSVP at 996.ggvc.com/sf.

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GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang interview Simon Zhang, (张溪梦), the founder and CEO of GrowingIO, a data analytics startup in China that helps product managers and marketers analyze mobile apps and websites without adding manual tracking codes. GrowingIO now counts over 6000 companies as its customers, including the likes of Didi, Momo, Tujia, and others.

Previously, Simon was senior director of business analytics at LinkedIn in its Silicon Valley headquarters, and before that, worked as a senior manager of site analytics at eBay. In 2015, he left a decade-long career in Silicon Valley to return to China and started his current startup, GrowingIO. But prior to all of this, Simon worked as a brain surgeon in China, and attended medical school in Tianjin. He also obtained an MBA from Baldwin-Wallace College in Ohio. Simon is also the author of the Chinese book 《首席增长官》 (“Chief Growth Officer”) and is a thought leader in the field of data-driven growth in China.

Simon discussed how Chinese engineers in Silicon Valley can crack the “bamboo ceiling”, how Chinese-style growth differs from Silicon Valley-style growth, and why “raising too much money” could create challenges for a startup.

The 996 Podcast is brought to you by GGV Capital, a global venture capital firm that invests in local founders. As a multi-stage, sector-focused firm, GGV focuses on seed-to-growth stage investments across Consumer/New Retail, Social/Digital & Internet, Enterprise/Cloud and Frontier Tech sectors. The firm was founded in 2000 and manages $6.2 billion in capital across 13 funds. Past and present portfolio companies include Affirm, Airbnb, Alibaba, Bitsight, ByteDance, Ctrip, Didi Chuxing, Grab, Gladly, Hello Chuxing, HashiCorp, Houzz, Keep, LingoChamp, Namely, Niu, Nozomi Networks, Opendoor, Peloton, Poshmark, Slack, Square, Wish, Xauto, Xiaohongshu, Yellow, YY, Zhaoyou and more. The firm has offices in Beijing, San Francisco, Shanghai and Silicon Valley. Learn more at ggvc.com, or “GGVCapital” on WeChat.

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang interview Doris Ke, a marketer and writer who has had an interesting career across the US and China. Doris grew up in China and went to the US for college, where she attended Bard College in New York. She started her career at Unilever where she worked on brand development, and then joined Michael Kors in New York where she was the social communications manager for APAC. In 2015, she left Michael Kors to become the head of marketing operations at Alipay US, based in Silicon Valley. In 2017, she returned to China to become the CMO of the Chinese startup YCloset (衣二三), which is often referred to as “the Chinese version of Rent the Runway”. She recently left YCloset to start her own marketing startup.

Throughout all of this, she has also been running a WeChat official account with around 100K followers called “doriskeke”, where she blogs about the cultural differences between US and China.

During this lively episode, Doris discussed the cultural differences between working at Chinese vs. American companies, lessons from her viral yet controversial marketing campaign at YCloset, what it is like to live in Beijing as a Shanghainese, and how she used the “growth mindset” to find her boyfriend (now husband).

This is a cross-over episode between 996 and Founder RealTalk, which is a biweekly podcast hosted by GGV managing partner Glenn Solomon. 

Glenn and Zara interview Orion Zhao (赵欧伦), the co-founder and CEO of Moka, a fast-growing HR SaaS startup in China. Moka helps companies increase the efficiency of their hiring process by providing a CRM software solution. It currently has hundreds of customers in China, including the likes of Xiaomi, Sougou, Burger King, and Levi's. Moka has completed its Series A+ fundraising round and is a GGV portfolio company.  

Orion is originally from China and graduated from Berkeley in 2013. He then spent close to two years working as a software engineer at Turo before returning to China in 2015 to start Moka with his co-founder Li Guoxing who is also a Chinese overseas returnee from Stanford. 

Orion discussed the challenges he faced as a “sea turtle” (海归) entrepreneur, why his experience joining a business fraternity at Berkeley came in handy in China, how he manages employees who are older than him, and the status quo of China’s SaaS market. 

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang discuss the trend known as “Chuhai” (出海), or Chinese founders targeting emerging markets outside of China, such as Southeast Asia, India, Latin America, and more.

As the mobile Internet market in China reaches saturation, an increasing number of Chinese entrepreneurs are now eyeing other developing markets where mobile Internet is just starting to take off; in fact, many of these countries are seeing their Internet sector dominated by Chinese companies. Factor Daily recently reported that 44 out of the 100 top apps in India (Google Play) are made by Chinese companies.

What are the reasons behind the “Chuhai” wave? How can they best recruit local talents and bridge the cultural gaps? How can they avoid the same mistakes that the US Internet companies made when then came to China?

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang interview George Yan (严治庆), the founder and CEO of Clobotics, (扩博智能). Founded in 2016, Clobotics is a computer vision startup that seeks to make traditional industries more intelligent. It is headquartered in Shanghai and Seattle with offices in Beijing, Dalian, and Singapore. It currently serves two industries: traditional retail and wind energy. Clobotics owns over 40 patents and has raised $21 million in VC funding. GGV was an early investor in Clobotics in 2017, and our managing partner Jenny Lee is on the board.

Prior to founding Clobotics, George spent 16 years at Microsoft in the US and in China. As the vice president and general manager of marketing and operations for Microsoft Greater China, he contributed to the double-digit growth for the region's $3 billion business. He was also responsible for the inception of Microsoft Cloud business in China, and led a massive team in landing Microsoft Azure and Office365 in China within less than 10 months, making Microsoft the first world-wide cloud service provider to land its service in mainland China. Before Microsoft, George worked at Goldman Sachs and McKinsey in the US. He holds a master's degree in financial engineering from Columbia.

George discussed how to find the “right timing” to leave big tech companies to become entrepreneurs, the lessons he drew from helping Microsoft land in China, and what it’s like to run a startup that is global from Day One.

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang interview Yan Li and Token Hu, the cofounders of NIU, or 牛电科技 (a.k.a 小牛电动车) in Chinese. NIU designs and manufactures smart and high-performance electric scooters. It is currently the largest lithium-ion battery-powered e-scooters company in China and a leader in Europe in terms of sales volume in 2017. As of June 30, 2018, NIU had sold more than 430,000 smart e-scooters in China, Europe and other countries. 

NIU's vision is to become the number one brand for urban mobility, powered by design and technology. Before NIU, smart electric two-wheeled vehicles did not exist in China, and two-wheeled vehicles were perceived low-end. The company has changed that perception with their smart e-scooters and premium brand.

NIU just went public on the NASDAQ in mid-October. GGV led NIU's series A back in 2015 and has backed the company in every round since then, all the way through its IPO. Our managing partner Jenny Lee is on the board. We are very excited to have Yan and Token with us on this episode, almost fresh off the plane from New York.

Yan and Token discussed how NIU became a lifestyle brand in China, the ups and downs during their amazing startup journey, and what it was like to take a Chinese company public on the NASDAQ.

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung, Jenny Lee, and Zara Zhang interview Tony Fadell, the inventor of the iPod, co-inventor of the iPhone, founder and former CEO of Nest, the company that pioneered the “Internet of Things,” and currently the Principal at Future Shape, an investment and advisory firm coaching deep tech startups. Tony was the SVP of Apple’s iPod Division and led the team that created the first 18 generations of the iPod and the first three generations of the iPhone. Throughout his career Tony has authored more than 300 patents. In May 2016, TIME named the Nest Learning Thermostat, the iPod and the iPhone as three of the “50 Most Influential Gadgets of All Time.”

Tony has been a long-time friend of GGV and of our managing partner Jenny Lee, who we have as a guest host on the show today.

Tony discusses why China might have a “last-mover advantage”, the qualities he look for in entrepreneurs, and how to discover the next game-changing technology.

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang interview Ashley Peng (彭琳琳), the founder and CEO of Xiaobu (小步), a mobile platform for young parents in China with kids aged 0-6 years old. By providing high-quality content and tools, Xiaobu helps their users navigate parenthood, which is a confusing period for many millennial parents. Xiaobu literally means "little steps" in Chinese. On Xiaobu, parents can take courses on parenting, enter a "parenting university", browse activities to do with their children, and post updates and photos to record their parenting journey. Xiaobu now has over 2 million users and growing fast.

Before starting Xiaobu last year, Ashley worked as a consultant at BCG China for 8 years, and then spent 2 years at Miya (蜜芽宝贝), a leading e-commerce company for mom-and-baby goods in China, where she was the VP of strategy and business assistant to the CEO. She holds a bachelor's and master's degree from Tsinghua University in journalism and public policy and obtained her MBA from the Stanford GSB in 2011. Xiaobu is a GGV portfolio company.

Ashley how she was inspired to start Xiaobu by her own journey as the mother of a young child, why millennial parents in China need a lot of help, and how she went about designing a product that’s highly engaging to users.

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang interview David Li (李学凌), the founder and CEO of YY, one of the first live streaming platforms in China. YY went public on the NASDAQ in 2012 and is now a multi-billion dollar company. YY also owns Huya, the leading game streaming platform in China which went public on the NYSE this May. David is also the co-founder and CEO of the Singapore-based BIGO, which is the leading live streaming platform in Southeast Asia. Before founding YY in 2005, David served as the editor in chief at NetEase. David received a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Renmin University of China in 1997.

GGV is lucky to count YY as a portfolio company, and our managing partner Jenny Lee was on the board of YY for seven years.

David discussed his evolution from a philosophy major to a journalist to an Internet entrepreneur, what it’s like to take a Chinese company public in 2012, and how YY came to spearhead innovative features of modern live-streaming products such as in-app tipping and virtual gifts.

Join our listeners' community via WeChat/Slack at 996.ggvc.com/community. GGV Capital also produces a biweekly email newsletter in English, also called “996,” which has a roundup of the week’s most important happenings in tech in China. Subscribe at 996.ggvc.com.

The 996 Podcast is brought to you by GGV Capital, a multi-stage venture capital firm based in Silicon Valley, Shanghai, and Beijing. We have been partnering with leading technology entrepreneurs for the past 18 years from seed to pre-IPO. With $6.2 billion in capital under management across 13 funds, GGV invests in globally minded entrepreneurs in consumer internet, e-commerce, frontier tech, and enterprise. GGV has invested in over 280 companies, with 30 companies valued at over $1 billion. Portfolio companies include Airbnb, Alibaba, Bytedance (Toutiao), Ctrip, Didi Chuxing, DOMO, Hashicorp, Hellobike, Houzz, Keep, Musical.ly, Slack, Square, Wish, Xiaohongshu, YY, and others. Find out more at ggvc.com.

GGV Capital’s Hans Tung and Zara Zhang discuss the firm’s recent investment in Yellow, a leading micro-mobility startup based in Brazil, which recently raised $63 million in Series A led by GGV Capital.

Yellow launched Brazil’s first dockless bike-sharing service in Sao Paulo in August 2018. It has also begun piloting e-scooters and developing e-bikes to provide a comprehensive micro-mobility solution to users in Brazil and beyond. Additionally, Yellow offers digital payments through its Yellow Pay platform.

We discuss how the investment thesis came together, and what it means for emerging market countries to have founders who aspire to play on a global scale. Hans discusses the characteristics in the team and the market for Yellow that made the investment so compelling. We also discuss the similarities between Latin America and Southeast Asia, and why startups across the world are starting to take inspiration not just from Silicon Valley, but also from China.