Since graduating from Davidson College (liberal arts school in North Carolina) in 1999, I developed new passions in learning about Asia, building technology companies, and establishing business partnerships. My interests in Asia, first, led me to Japan to teach and coach as an Assistant Language Teacher on the JET Program.
After a year, GE called and Hong Kong became my new home. From 2000-2003, I worked at the GE Equity Asia where I analyzed investments in India, Greater China, Japan and Korea and worked closely with other divisions. I spent three years learning technology, Asia, and finance – even passing all 3 levels of the CFA.
The rise of China was becoming more apparent day by day, so I went to Shanghai to get first hand experience while working on a Duke MBA overseas. Catching the Shanghai entrepreneurial fervor, I started a mobile phone game company. We launched our games in China, Thailand, and Malaysia. In 2005, we sold the company to our partner in Singapore. After selling the company I moved to San Francisco.
My first job was as a Principal for Mitsui’s Investment Group. I worked on technology investments and helped them expand to Japan. After two years, I wanted to build a startup so I left, and I landed at Boku as the first business hire. Boku is a mobile payments company that connects 300 carriers in 60 countries to large digital merchants like Apple, Sony, and Google.
Over the last 7 years, I led global business development and closed deals with Apple, Sony, Microsoft, Tencent. In late 2013, I returned to Asia to build out Boku’s presence in the region. I established offices in Japan, China, Taiwan, Singapore and acquired a company in India. I closed about 50 mobile phone carriers in Asia and Middle East such as China Mobile, Softbank, Singtel, and so on.
Today, I volunteer at American Chamber in Tokyo. I speak a very high level of Japanese and basic Chinese.