Investment Team

Kiha Lee, Partner

Kiha earned his PhD in Mechanical Engineering and MS in Computer Science from University of California, Berkeley. He co-founded Sazze, Inc. in Silicon Valley in 2005 and serves as CEO. Sazze, Inc. is a parent company to a number of fast-growing eCommerce sites including DealsPlus.com, Whizwallet.com, and Lately (formerly ShopLately).

In 2012, he joined Primer as a partner, and in 2014 he launched Sazze Partners, a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm that invests in Korea and the U.S. 

Kiha currently lives and works in Silicon Valley. To meet more Korean startups, he makes frequent business trips to Korea as well as holds virtual meetings.

Greg Kwangrog Kim, Partner

Kwangrog co-founded Sazze, Inc. in 2005 and serves as CFO, overseeing finance and human resources, and supervising strategy, product management and online marketing on various company projects.  He set up several eCommerce projects at Sazze, Inc., including DealsPlus.com, WhizWallet.com and Progrids.

Kwangrog co-founded Sazze Partners in 2014. He focuses on transformative consumer tech companies. Prior to co-founding Sazze, Kwangrog studied Civil Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. 

Kwangrog currently lives in Silicon Valley and travels between Silicon Valley and Seoul.

Sukhyun Kim, Partner

Sukhyun Kim has over 15 years of professional experience in Finance, Gaming, Healthcare, and Ad-Tech from CRIT Ventures, Com2uS, Neowiz, IGAWorks, Mirae Asset, and INFINITT Healthcare.
 
Prior to joining Primer Sazze as a Partner, he was Executive VP at CRIT Ventures, a venture capital firm that focuses on global interactive content.  He led multiple successful investments at CRIT Ventures with expertise in interactive content, AI, Tech, and ICT service. He was previously the head of corporate development at Com2uS, a leading developer and publisher of mobile games, and managed the company’s M&A, Investment, and Corporate Strategy.  

Sukhyun holds B.A. in German Language Education from Seoul National University. ‌Sukhyun currently lives in Seoul, Korea. 

Do Gyun Guen, Partner

Do Gyun (Douglas) is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Primer, Inc. (“Primer”), the first startup accelerator in South Korea. Previously, he established five technology businesses, including INITECH (password authentication), INICIS (payments), and KMPS (credit card processing). First Data purchased INITECH, and Mr. Guen served as CEO of First Data International Korea, Inc. Two of the companies have been registered on the KOSDAQ. 

Do Gyun graduated from Kyungpook National University in 1986 and worked as a computer programmer and researcher for 11 years at Kia Motors and DACOM. 

Do Gyun currently focuses on mentoring new entrepreneurs in Korea through Primer.

Ohsang Kwon, Partner

‌Ohsang was Director General at the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) in Korea, before co-founding Primer Sazze. Prior to that, he taught and did research on finance and technology management at CHA University and Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST). Before professorship, he worked for Deutsche Bank, Hong Kong and Seoul, as Director, and for Barclays Capital, London and Singapore. He also worked for Kia Motors and Samsung SDS as an engineer for 8 years. His several books on finance and technology were bestsellers.

He holds an MBA from INSEAD, Fontainebleau, France and obtained his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.

Kasey (Kyungsil) Roh, Principal 

Prior to joining Primer Sazze, Kasey (Kyungsil) managed over $10 billion in capital investment at Facebook and Tesla, managing the companies' capital allocation strategy, debt financing facilities, and various executive portfolio reporting.

While working full-time, Kasey co-founded Iterative Venture, an angel investment community for Facebook alumni, and grew it into over 2,000 LPs and led multiple early-stage investment deals.

Kasey holds a master's degree in Economics/ Finance from Johns Hopkins University and a bachelor's degree in International Relations from Seoul National University. 
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‌Kasey currently lives in Silicon Valley and travels between Silicon Valley and Seoul. 

Venture Partner

Aviram Jenik, Venture Partner

Aviram is an Israeli angel investor and serial entrepreneur living in Seoul and Silicon Valley.
He is the Founder and CEO of Beyond Security, a leading provider of security testing tools. His experience includes two successful exits with previous startups.

Since 2013, he has been actively investing in Korean startups and has personally invested in 17 Korean startups to date and actively mentors many others.

He received a Master of Business Administration from Tel Aviv University and a B.S. in Computer Science from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology.

Sang-hun Kim, Venture Partner

Sang-hun Kim is Vice President of Woowa Brothers, Corp. Previously, Sang-hun was CEO of South Korea's largest internet company, NAVER Corp., from 2009 to March 2017, leading the company's worldwide expansion beyond the country. 

In 2017, Sang-hun joined Primer as a partner, and he's been actively mentoring entrepreneurs in South Korea.

Sang-hun graduated from Seoul National University and received an LL.M. degree from Harvard Law School. He is admitted to both the Korean Bar Association and the New York Bar Association. He had served as a judge in the Seoul District Court and was General Counsel at LG Corp before joining NAVER Corp.

Songyee Yoon, Venture Partner 

Songyee Yoon spent 15 years in a leadership role at NCSOFT (KRX:036570), a global online game developer and publisher. In her capacity as President and Chief Strategy Officer, she led the AI transformation of the company to actively use AI for game development and various aspects of businesses. She oversaw the company's growth from a 350-person company to an over 5000 people organization across 7 countries in Asia, Europe, and North America. Songyee was responsible for early monetization strategy, organizational strategy, marketing, branding, business development and partnership, licensing, and other various strategic initiatives including leading the ESG committee and NC University. 

Songyee has personally made numerous angel investments including Gusto, Rubrik, Robinhood (Nasdaq: Hood), Kakao Corp (KRX: 035720) and Next VR (Acquired by Apple). 

She has a Ph D in Computational Neuroscience from MIT, where she serves as a board member. Songyee is an inaugural member of the Advisory Council of Stanford University’s Human-Centered AI Center and has a passion for working with visionary entrepreneurs. 

Richard Chen, Venture Partner 

Richard Chen is a founder of Iterative Ventures, an angel investment syndicate of 3,000+ ex-Facebook/ Meta alumni. Richard led various investment deals in the Web 3 space, including blockchain infrastructure (Blockdaemon, Huddle), AR/VR, and blockchain gaming startups. 
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‌Prior to Iterative Ventures, Richard worked as Data Engineer and Data Scientist at Facebook and Snapchat. Richard also worked at an early-stage Digital Heath startup, Zipongo, as one of the early Full-Stack Software Engineers. 
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Richard received his Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and Math Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles. 

David Paik, Venture Partner 

David Paik, PhD is an instructor at Stanford Cardiovascular Institute with expertise in basic and translational cardiovascular research. Dr. Paik's focus is to utilize single-cell multi-omics tools to elucidate patient-specific cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying various cardiovascular diseases, characterize embryonic heart development, and optimize the differentiation of induced pluripotent stem cells to cardiovascular cells.
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‌Dr. Paik received his BA in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at Boston University (2010) and PhD in Cell and Developmental Biology at Vanderbilt University (2015). 

Operation Team

Blaire (Hyejin) Yoo, Manager

Blaire Joined Primer Sazze in 2021 and focuses on managing fund operations and investor relations.

Prior to joining Primer Sazze, Blaire worked in Pinecone 41 as an R&D Tax consultant and provided tax insights for startups in the Bay Area. Blaire led global marketing strategies of launching products as a marketing manager at LG Electronics and worked with global marketing and PR agencies. Prior to her time at LG, she was a Research Assistant at Bain & Company.
 

  • Blaire holds a bachelor's degree in Business Administration and Management from Seoul National University.