Phoenix Venture Partners

Investment decisions are made by the partnership, which is led by John T. Chen and includes Nobuyuki Kambe, Jiong Ma, Avinash Kant, Srinivas Rao, Sheng Peng, and Jennifer Wang. Two scientist-entrepreneurs, David Soane and Frank Levinson, serve as Partner Emeritus and provide ongoing strategic guidance. The firm emphasizes its interdisciplinary team of operators and scientists as central to its investment process.

PVP targets transformative technologies in advanced materials, novel devices, innovative manufacturing processes, and state-of-the-art tools. Sector applications include computing, electronics, transportation, energy, industrial, and life sciences. The firm invests from early-stage proof-of-concept through revenue-stage commercialization.

Phoenix Venture Partners operates as a traditional venture capital firm, not a family office. It is structured as a limited liability company with a multi-partner investment team, managing outside capital and deploying it into deep-tech startups across North America and Asia.

The firm's main office is in San Mateo, California, in the heart of Silicon Valley. PVP also maintains an office in Ningbo, China, which supports portfolio companies with manufacturing partnerships and market access in Asia.

The firm states it invests from early to revenue stage, which by definition includes the capacity to participate in later rounds. Its hands-on model — with assistance in financing and exit planning — further suggests a willingness to support companies across multiple funding cycles, though specific follow-on reserve policies are not publicly disclosed.

PVP sources through its network of strategic corporate partners and the technical networks of its scientist-operator partnership. The firm's dual-office structure in California and Ningbo provides a sourcing channel for US-based materials-science startups seeking Asian manufacturing scale and for Asian hard-tech companies targeting US commercialization.

FIGUR8 was acquired by Myant, an existing PVP portfolio company, to enhance Myant's Internet of Humans platform with musculoskeletal intelligence. The transaction represents PVP's strategy of supporting portfolio companies' inorganic growth to deepen their technology moats and expand addressable markets.