Source Code Capital

Founding partner Cao Yi leads the investment committee alongside partner Zhang Honghe. Cao previously ran Sequoia China's seed-stage practice, where he sourced ByteDance and Meituan. The partnership is deliberately compact — fewer than a dozen managing directors control allocation — with no external LP board or parent GP overriding local decisions.

The firm originates through a founder-alumni network that traces back to Tsinghua, Zhejiang University, and Shanghai Jiao Tong University's engineering and computer science departments. Portfolio founders actively refer spinout teams and second-time founders to the partnership. This network is concentrated in enterprise AI, semiconductors, and autonomous systems — sectors where academic lab credentials signal technical readiness better than pitch decks.

Both. Source Code runs parallel USD and RMB vehicles, a dual-currency structure that lets portfolio companies choose their listing jurisdiction without forcing a last-minute restructuring. The firm closed its fifth USD fund in 2023 and held a first close on a sixth USD fund in May 2024, even as aggregate China USD venture fundraising fell to decade lows.

Initial checks range from $1M at seed to $15M at Series A, with the firm reserving capital to follow through Series D and beyond. In concentrated positions, total commitment can exceed $100M across a single company's lifecycle, reflecting the firm's conviction-weighted deployment model rather than index-style portfolio construction.

Source Code's portfolio has tilted heavily toward domestic enterprise and deep-tech companies that serve China's internal market — autonomous driving, industrial robotics, HR SaaS, AI chips — reducing direct exposure to cross-border regulatory friction. The firm does not publicly disclose LP composition by geography, but the ability to deploy RMB alongside USD capital gives portfolio companies a domestic listing path.

The firm has largely stayed away from consumer internet, edtech, and crypto — sectors that dominated China VC from 2015–2021 but faced steep regulatory headwinds. This posture predated the 2021 regulatory crackdown and reflects Cao Yi's stated preference for engineering-moat businesses over capital-intensive customer-acquisition models.

Independent. Cao Yi left Sequoia China in 2014 to launch Source Code as an autonomous partnership. There is no parent GP, no offshore anchor LP controlling strategy, and no corporate venture arm affiliation. The firm has maintained this independence through five USD fund closes and parallel RMB vehicles.