CeCe Cheng

I am grateful to have interviewed Jessie Jia Guo of Next Legacy Partners for this latest edition of the Asian Tech Collective newsletter. Jessie brings a unique lens as an investor at a fund-of-funds platform with a philanthropic mission—at a moment when the fundraising environment is anything but straightforward. Her take on what LPs are prioritizing right now is a must-read for GPs navigating this market. This issue also features great profiles on: • Eric Bahn (Hustle Fund) • Alex Lee (Truewind) Thanks to my collaborators: Judy L. Samantha Huang and Ryan Chou for pulling this together. Check out the full issue below. #AsiansInTech #Founders #VC #LP #AAPI

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Maybe it’s old-fashioned, but at Adaptation Ventures we actually write our own newsletters - and my favorite part is looking across history, industries, and cultures to share insights about disability, innovation, and capital allocation. This past quarter, it was Ludwig van Beethoven, who composed his Ninth Symphony while profoundly deaf, turning constraint into creative advantage. The quarter before, it was “Crumbling Barriers: Graham Crackers and Growth Mindsets”: Paul Graham of Y Combinator and Benjamin Graham, author of The Intelligent Investor and Warren Buffett’s teacher and primary mentor - two very different, but deeply influential guides for founders and investors alike. Before that, we dug into Epictetus, one of history’s most influential Stoic philosophers, born into slavery nearly 2,000 years ago and disabled as a child, whose ideas still resonate with how resilient founders can navigate adversity. With the speed of information and constant innovation, it can be grounding to pause and explore how the themes of history apply to the modern world. As the saying goes, it may not repeat - but it often rhymes. If you enjoy this lens on disability, neurodivergence, and accessibility - our quarterly digest is for you. Check out the latest edition and sign up for the newsletter for the most timely access.

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💜 Our investment in Phoebe When we first met Justin Woodbridge, the indefatigable CEO and founder Phoebe, it was clear he and the team were building something important and far more than another workflow tool. The care infrastructure in America, particularly in-home healthcare, is under immense strain, with administrative overhead consuming meaningful dollars and attention that should go to caregivers and patients. If you've ever had to take care of a loved one, you know this problem deeply. Phoebe’s mission to modernize home healthcare with agent-native logistics infrastructure -  software that doesn’t just assist, but executes and coordinates autonomously -  is exactly the kind of enduring problem coupled with durable technology that resonates with our thesis. What truly stood out was the team’s ability to translate complex operational pain into elegant AI solutions that *people* will meaningfully use. Phoebe’s platform uses AI agents to automate processes like scheduling, intake, and coordination across a network of 24/7 care delivery, enabling agencies to run efficiently without asking caregivers or managers to adopt entirely new systems. By allowing agents to operate atop existing infrastructure (EHRs and workflows) and handle the heavy lifting of administrative work, Phoebe unlocks productivity and profitability in a market that desperately needs it. The fact that the company has already reached meaningful early traction and hit $1M in ARR within months of launching reinforces that they’re not just promising change, they’re delivering measurable impact. Moxxie Ventures backed Phoebe because they represent the kind of founder-led, technically sophisticated, mission-oriented company we believe can define a new category. Led by a team with deep operational empathy and a clear understanding of the systemic problems facing home care, Phoebe is building software that meets the moment: AI that runs work, not just augments it. In a world where care is one of the fastest-growing and most critical infrastructures, tools that self-drive operations - gaining efficiency, reducing cost, and improving outcomes - are indispensable. We’re excited to support Phoebe’s journey and co-invest with our friends at Slow Ventures (Yoni Rechtman), Quiet Capital (Michael Bloch), Jonathan Ehrlich and Gokul Rajaram (what a dream team!), and look forward to the impact Phoebe will have on the care ecosystem. 

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NYC is losing young technical founders to SF — and it’s not about vibes. It’s about cost of entry. SF has far more entry infrastructure than NYC: i.e. the housing, community, and early support (financial and otherwise) that lets founders start building before they raise capital. This is widening the gap between the two cities' tech sectors. We are specifically calling for ideas (and hopefully action) to address NYC’s dearth of hacker houses: physical spaces that combine housing, workspace, community, and early peer support. I’m convinced that seeding hacker houses, if done right, is a low-cost, high-impact way to attract more young technical founders to NYC — and critically, something this community can actually do. And we should. The data is stark. Venture investment in NYC is ~19% of SF’s total — the lowest since 2017 — and the biggest, most innovative companies (especially in AI) are overwhelmingly being built in San Francisco. People who want to be entrepreneurs tend to work where those companies are. Unsurprisingly, many students and young builders assume they must go west. But do they actually want to — or is it just easier to get started there? I spent significant time in the Bay last year, and one difference stood out immediately: SF is dense with hacker houses and founder residences that help people get from 0→1. These resources are especially critical for recent grads and first-time founders who might lack capital or built-in networks. NYC may have long-term pull, but at the earliest stage, higher upfront costs and friction (recent Economist data suggests ~50% higher rents than SF) push many founders away. Hacker houses may sound anachronistic, but they’re real centers of gravity. We estimate SF has at least ~10x more active hacker houses than NYC, and that these houses have helped foster hundreds of billions of dollars in market value. I’m an NYC tech evangelist. I’ve worked on tech ecosystem development at New York City Economic Development Corporation, helped design national innovation programs for the Obama White House, and now invest in early-stage companies as a GP at Max Ventures. From a dollars-to-impact perspective, seeding hacker houses in NYC is one of the most efficient levers the city can pull. We wrote an overview doc (linked below) that explores this concept — and we'd welcome feedback from the NYC tech community. We are also hosting a small series of conversations — starting with a dinner in February co-hosted with Tech:NYC, Keel (Brent J. Smith), Company Ventures and Inspired Capital — to bring together leaders across tech, real estate, and policy. 👉 If you’re a founder, operator, VC, student, or have built / lived in a hacker house: • Does this resonate? • What would make this work in NYC? • Who’s already doing something adjacent we should talk to? Would love to connect if you’re interested in contributing or joining the conversation.

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As much as I love ChatGPT, it has real limitations in mental health contexts, especially when used as a therapeutic tool. It (and other LLMs) lack clinical grounding and safety constraints. Jimini Health just released a thoughtful framework for patient-facing AI: The New Hippocratic Code, a set of safety principles for LLM-native mental health tools. If you're building or investing in this space, it's worth a read: https://lnkd.in/d_AaQenK

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I hosted a discussion yesterday at unlock VC (previously WVC:E) Summit about Barriers to Progression with some incredible women. However, I left the session feeling frustrated and honestly a bit angry. One question in particular that has stuck with me is a young woman asking for advice on how to manage a situation where her firm has hired a male counterpart but on a much higher salary. She didn’t know how to bring it up. Now, I’m not really one for giving advice (for many reasons) but I’m disappointed that we are still having these discussions today. So here are a few things I wish someone had told me earlier: On pay gaps: You don’t need to tiptoe around this. Book time with your manager, bring data (market rates, your contributions, comparable roles), and state your case directly. If they’re defensive rather than collaborative, that tells you everything you need to know about whether this is somewhere you can grow. On knowing your worth: Keep a running doc of your wins - deals you’ve sourced, value you’ve added, relationships you’ve built. When imposter syndrome hits (and it will), you’ll have receipts. When comp conversations come up, you’ll have ammunition. On finding your people: The women who’ve helped me most in this industry weren’t at my firm (because there weren’t any). Build your kitchen cabinet - other women and men in VC, founders, mentors who’ll tell you the truth and have your back. The ones who supported me ended up being my co-founders at Pact. These relationships matter more than any single job. On when to walk: Sometimes the best career move is leaving. If you’re constantly fighting to be heard, paid fairly, or taken seriously, your energy is better spent somewhere that actually values you. There are firms getting this right. If you’re dealing with any of this - pay disparities, being overlooked, or just feeling stuck - please DM me and let’s talk. I’d like to offer support where I can. Any other advice? Itxaso del Palacio, PhD Natasha Lytton Katharine Spooner Kadi-Ingrid Lilles Francesca (Check) Warner Camilla Dolan Isabelle O'Keeffe Tong Gu Reem Wyndham Roxane Sanguinetti Sophie Winwood

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Fervo Energy just announced a massive $421M of *non-recourse* project finance for the first phase of Cape Station, which is their first full scale project! Nice work!

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"Build the event you wish existed" That's what we at Monadical did last week at #NYTW. We wanted an AI Engineers discussion for Engineers. There's always a lot of events out there for VCs to network, or for startups to learn about G2M, but very little on lessons learned from actual engineers in the field. So that's the event we hosted. Big thank yous to our awesome panel, Roy Pereira, Ben Cohen and Corey J. Gallon. Here's the key takeaways and the AI tools we're using. 🚀 All three panelists independently called AI Agents the most transformative LLM application they’ve used. They specifically called out Claude 3.5 Sonnet for its accuracy and reliability. 🪨 We dug into how LLMs are “jagged”, not general. They can be shockingly good at some tasks and completely fail at others. Everyone agreed: good evaluations are critical (and hard.) 🧪 Corey noted how public benchmarks and reality are two different things. Most public evals are saturated or gamed. ♊ Ben emphasized that AI projects are actually two projects: building the tool and building the evaluation process. 🧱 We explored how falling dev costs may impact startup defensibility and labor demand. Roy shared that founders are already shifting strategies in response. ⚒️ In a world of daily AI launches, the panel discussed how they decide what’s worth attention, and what’s just noise. They called out tools like Goose, Aider, Claude Code, and Monadical’s own Cubbi, which helps run agentic workflows safely in dev environments. (links in the comments). CTA: What would you want to hear in an AI Applied Engineering talk you attended?

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For healthcare innovators, the Techstars x Permanente Medicine Mid-Atlantic States program is an incredible path to enterprise validation, deep mentorship, investor access, and long-term founder support. If you’re building the next generation of health tech, definitely join the AMA and learn more about the program.

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Discover why new venture capitalists are backing mental health initiatives and celebrating $100M exits. Get insights here: https://lnkd.in/eKYaRF6E #MentalHealth #VCFunding

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We're incredibly excited to partner with Zach Cohen, Raymond W., and the broader Ease Health team as they rebuild behavioral health's infrastructure from the ground up!

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