Ethos Fund
Pre-seed fund backing third culture founders and globally ambitious startups in Vietnam and the US.
🇺🇸 Los Angeles, California · Founded 2022
Checks Up to $1M·Pre-seed to Seed
Ethos Fund is an early-stage venture firm founded in 2022 by serial entrepreneurs David Yi and Simon Shin. Yi was CEO of Riiid Labs and led Asia for ACT.org and K12.com. Shin founded Cypher Partners and invested at Bluepoint Partners in Korea. The fund backs what it calls third culture founders in the US and very early startups in Vietnam, often as the first check. It closed a $12M first fund in March 2024.
What they invest in
We invest in founders from the earliest stages (often, the first check) and continue to support their long term vision. We believe startups are a marathon, not a sprint.
- Check size
- Up to $1M
- Stage
- Pre-seed to Seed
- Fund
- Fund I · $12M
- Closed 2024
- Edtech
- Fintech
- Digital health
- Blockchain
- AI
- Vietnam
- United States
- Southeast Asia
How to pitch
They read inbound pitches that match the criteria above.
Open to
- Pitches from founders
Founders can tell the fund about their startup through the Pitch Us button on its site.
Portfolio
The fund's site lists 23 portfolio companies since 2022. Most are pre-seed and seed deals in the US and Vietnam. They span AI, bitcoin and blockchain, edtech, fintech, health and consumer.
Some of the companies they have backed
The portfolio at a glance · 24 companies · 2022–2025
Sectors
- Agritech4%
- AI marketing4%
- Bitcoin wallet4%
- Edtech4%
- Other4%
Stage when they invested
- Pre-seed4%
- Seed25%
- Series A4%
Where the companies are
- 🇻🇳 Vietnam4%
Names from the fund's own site plus Caplight. Rounds and years from CB Insights, Caplight and TechCrunch, as of Oct 2026. Details are missing for many companies.
Co-investors and partners
Funds that invested in the same rounds.
