Michael Zhu is an experienced serial entrepreneur, seasoned investor, international speaker, and cross-border innovator.
Michael founded Accathon Capital, a family office backed cross-border innovation & investment firm headquartered in New York City with offices in Beijing and Shanghai. Michael leads Accathon Capital to invest globally in emerging Venture Capital Funds as well as in sector & location agnostic ambitious founders looking to expand businesses into Asia. Michael also build reputable cross-border innovation programs to infuse the collaboration between large corporations and global startups in the cross-border market.
Prior Accathon Capital, Michael co-founded a cross-border innovation hub – Lair East in 2015, which is the first “Tech & Culture” themed collaborative co-working space and global entrepreneur communities on the East Coast connecting work, leisure, and knowledge for global entrepreneurs in the business of disrupting technology and shaping cross-border communications. Through Lair East, Michael worked with and advised over 100 startups, facilitated over 15 cross-border programs, and spearheaded international expansions for multiple organizations. Michael was also an LP investor at Palm Drive Capital and Lair East Labs, whose portfolio includes Boom, Jet.com, Zenefits, Clover Health, WeLab, Catalyte, and, b8ta, and supported Eximchain in a post-program $20MM fundraising.
Michael is serving as the Advisory Board member in multiple startups and an advisor at the NYC Chinese Entrepreneur Organization. He was also named as one of the “Top 30 Entrepreneurs Under 30 in Northeastern America” by Mandarin Quarterly. Michael holds an M.S. in Investment Management from Pace University. In 2018, as the only Asian representative, Michael also sat in the Host Committee of Cela (f.k.a. Accelerator Awesome), the first-ever accelerator conference connecting top innovation organizations such as Techstars, 500 Startups, Dreamit, SAP, Verizon, NUMA New York, Google, and more.