AMA with CVCs Featuring Andy Cheng (GrandTech Cloud Services Inc.)

If you want to understand how global CVCs really think, beyond your local ecosystem, don’t miss our “AMA with CVCs Featuring Andy Cheng (GrandTech Cloud Services Inc.)”. With over 20+ portfolio investments and 4 GP commitments, and a track record of writing $500K–$1M checks for Series A–C stage startups, Andy brings rare cross-border insight shaped by years of operating across China, the US, India, and Southeast Asia.

Now serving as Head of Japan at GrandTech Cloud Services Inc. (TPEx: 7747), Andy works inside one of Asia-Pacific’s fastest-growing cloud and FinOps-focused companies. GrandTech Cloud Services, operating across Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and Japan, is known as “A Friend to Startups,” helping founders scale through multi-cloud optimization, cost control, and cloud aggregation models built specifically for the APAC new economy.

In this AMA, Andy will share candid, practical insights at the intersection of venture capital, cross-border growth, and cloud-driven scaling, including:

-How cross-border VCs identify, assess, and support high-potential startups
-What investors look for in founders entering global markets
-How early-stage companies can prepare for international scaling
-The biggest challenges in cross-border fundraising and how to navigate them
-The role of strategic capital in M&A, exits, and portfolio growth
-How FinOps and multi-cloud strategies (core to GrandTech’s model) give startups execution advantages
-This session is a rare opportunity to learn directly from an investor who bridges venture strategy + cloud infrastructure scale across APAC.

🎙 Speaker

Andy Cheng – Head of Japan, GrandTech Cloud Services Inc.

A cross-border early-stage investor with deep experience in full-cycle VC operations, legal structuring, due diligence, portfolio scaling, and M&A execution—now driving cloud innovation and startup enablement across the Asia-Pacific region through GrandTech Cloud Services.

Moderator:

Erdinc Ekinci - Founder, Investment Lead of Co-capital.vc, Co-Founder, CEO of Openfor.co, Managing Director of Founder Institute Japan/Korea/Taiwan

📌 Who Should Attend

-Early-stage founders raising venture or corporate investment
-Startup teams entering or planning cross-border market expansion
-Founders seeking insights on scaling beyond their home market
-Anyone curious about global VC dynamics and international investor expectations

📌 What You Will Learn

-How cross-border investors evaluate global market potential
-How VC operations differ across the US, China, India, and SEA
-What global investors look for in Series A–C founders
-How to build scalable, data-driven market expansion strategies
-Investor perspectives on navigating cross-border legal and structural challenges
-How to leverage partners like Meetsocial for growth, distribution, and intelligence
-Common pitfalls startups face when expanding internationally

About Founder Institute:

-Founder Institute: Founder Institute, which originated in Silicon Valley, is a founder and idea stage accelerator, and with its Founder Capital, backs the best performing FI alumni as early as the angel stage. FI has over 8K+ startup portfolio (Including leading e-learning platform Udemy, IPO in Nasdaq $3,8B) across 200 cities in 100 countries around the world.) We are also the largest mentor network in the world, with over 35,000 mentors, and our alumni have already raised over $2 billion in US dollars and have recently exceeded the 10K mark of investors network as the FI-Venture-Network.

-FI’s sister program, called VC Lab, helps launch aspiring investors into launching VC firms. As an accelerator that allows both sides of the table, 70% of the activities we do are advocacy of entrepreneurship and ecosystem creation, which means we do way more activity than the accelerator to promote entrepreneurship to solve real-world problems with entrepreneurship in an economically feasible way, build a company that grows into a venture-scale.

-Openfor.co: A “Global Partnership Accelerator” originated in Silicon Valley that combined with an online platform and marketplace for learning, building, launching, monetizing, and growing partner ecosystems and a collaborative community around you for achieving effective marketing, sales, community building, GTM, fundraising, and many more.

-Co-Capital: Pre-seed & Seed stage new firm that focuses on hands-on GTM, sales, and partnership support, focusing on English-speaking Asian founders who have global ambitions from day ONE. Domiciled in the USA, with regional appearances in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. Utilizes partnerships with the GTM expert network and the venture partner network across 20 major hubs and a network of 35 other VC networks who are willing to co-back our founders!