ZhenFund (真格基金) is a Beijing-headquartered venture capital firm focused on seed and early-stage investment. Founded in 2011 by New Oriental co-founders Bob Xiaoping Xu and Victor Qiang Wang in collaboration with Sequoia Capital China, the firm brought in Anna Fang as a founding partner shortly after launch — Fang now serves as CEO. In 2016, Reuters described ZhenFund as China's largest angel investment fund, a reputation built on backing exceptional young founders at the very start.
ZhenFund's public identity is unapologetically founder-first. Its official site's statement of beliefs argues that good entrepreneurs are rare and precious, that they perceive promising directions more keenly than investors do, and that a good angel institution should stand firmly with founders — offering fast decisions, friendly terms and genuine commitment, helping without meddling and sharing rather than instructing.
Investment thesis and focus
The firm's guiding principle is people-first: truly outstanding people create great companies. ZhenFund invests across the internet, technology, artificial intelligence, corporate services, healthcare and education, deliberately ranging wide so long as the founding team is exceptional. It keeps offices in Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen, positioning itself at the centre of China's most active startup ecosystems.
Fund size and cheque size
ZhenFund has not publicly disclosed a fund corpus. Industry data firm VC Sheet reports an average cheque size of $250,000 to $3 million, a portfolio network of over 800 companies and more than 30 China unicorns — figures reported by VC Sheet, not the firm itself. What is on the record from the firm is its commitment to speed: quick decision-making and founder-friendly terms are central to how it presents itself to entrepreneurs.
Portfolio highlights
ZhenFund's notable investments include EHang, the autonomous aerial vehicle company; Xiaohongshu, the lifestyle and shopping platform; VIPKid, the online English education company; Mobvoi, the AI wearables company; Niu Technologies, the electric scooter maker; Momenta, the autonomous driving company; LightInTheBox, the e-commerce platform; Jiayuan.com, the online dating site; and Ucommune, the co-working operator. The breadth of this list — from drones to dating — reflects a fund that bets on founders first and sectors second.
People and programmes
Xu Xiaoping, the firm's managing partner, is one of China's most famous angel investors, sometimes called the country's answer to Ron Conway; a trained musician and author of more than ten books, he began angel investing in 2006 after New Oriental became the first Chinese education company listed on the NYSE. Anna Fang, CEO, came to the firm via Sequoia's Neil Shen and has led its institutional build-out. Rather than running a branded accelerator, ZhenFund's founder support is embedded in its model: it promises founders it will stand with them, decide fast and offer fair, friendly terms.
Why it matters for founders
ZhenFund matters as the archetype of the founder-first seed fund: it rewards exceptional teams over polished decks, decides quickly, and has the track record to prove the model — dozens of unicorns from seed cheques. For founders building in or connected to China, or for anyone studying how great seed funds operate, it is a benchmark worth knowing.