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Wesley Chan
American venture capitalist and co-founder of FPV
Wesley Chan, born in 1978, is a prominent American venture capitalist and the co-founder and managing partner of FPV Ventures, a venture capital firm established in 2022 with a focus on early-stage life sciences and technology startups. The firm has raised a total of $450 million, primarily from mission-driven investors such as charities and universities.14
Education and Early Career
Chan graduated with a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he also conducted research at the MIT Media Lab.1 He began his career at Google, where he played a key role in developing Google Analytics and Google Voice, as well as building Google's early advertising system. His work at Google earned him 17 patents and recognition as a founding General Partner of Google Ventures (GV), where he led significant investments in numerous successful startups.123
Venture Capital and Notable Investments
Before co-founding FPV Ventures, Chan was a Managing Director at Felicis Ventures, where he continued to build his reputation as a leading investor in the tech space. His notable investments include early stakes in several "decacorns" (companies valued over $10 billion) and "unicorns" (companies valued over $1 billion), such as Canva, Flexport, Robinhood, and Plaid.245 He is recognized for his product-led growth expertise and has been named one of the top seed investors by Business Insider in 2021 and 2022.12
Personal Life and Interests
Chan is also involved in the arts, serving on the board of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. He resides in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where he is known for his appreciation of the area's natural beauty.12
Overall, Wesley Chan's career reflects a blend of technological innovation and venture capital success, making him a significant figure in the startup ecosystem.
Highlights
Susan Wojcicki passed away this morning after fighting a two year battle with non-small-cell lung cancer. I had the very good fortune of working with her closely during my 14 year tenure at Google. I also had the privilege fighting many battles at Google with her to build and launch some of the most consequential products in tech.
In a startup full of ambitious, bull-in-the-china-shop engineers, Susan had a quiet elegance to her that both tamed the craziness and inspired teams to push themselves to do things that they thought were impossible at the start. She helped launch AdSense, then became CEO of YouTube and quieted the infighting on the team. Along the way, she inspired so many teams to build so many amazing features on the Google Ads system that it still remains likely the most lucrative invention in the history of the internet.
Most importantly, Susan could spot talent and was willing to nurture crazy misfits under her wing. My first year at Google was terrible and I was horribly ineffective. I was immature, had a bull-in-the-china-shop, get-out-of-my-way attitude which, in a company full of geniuses and highly experienced people who knew way more than me, was not welcome. The early managers I worked with deemed me unmanagable, and unbeknownst to me I was on a path to exit the company.
Susan took me under her wing (likely as a last resort manager) and quietly whispered to me, "you have immense potential, but you need to find ways to help others understand your potential and the promise of your ideas."
She paired me up with Gokul Rajaram and put us on the AdSense launch team. AdSense launched, I calmed down, and with Susan's coaching I was able to help start and launch Google Analytics, Google Voice, among many other highly visible products at Google that helped to define my career. Her quiet elegance set an example that made me wiser, more effective, and most importantly, taught me that the highest calling in life was to serve and enable others rather than just looking out for myself.
Susan's ability to spot talent was unrivaled. She also helped nurture the careers and enable the success of many future tech luminaries. In additional to Gokul Rajaram (who is one the wisest product coaches and investors I know), Susan helped jumpstart the careers of Shuman Ghosemajumder (Shape Security and Reken co-founder), future Google CEO Sundar Pichai, founder and investor Josh McFarland and many others.
Susan passed away at 56. She accomplished more in her career than much of Silicon Valley combined, while happily married to Dennis Troper and raised five children. In addition to her wonderful family she leaves behind a legacy of products that the world now can't live without, and an alumni of product luminaries and well-known founders that continue her legacy today. I will miss her, as will the many she helped to nuture.
Cliff Obrecht, Melanie Perkins and Cameron Adams launched their new redesign of Canva today in Los Angeles to 2.5 million people who joined live and tuned in online. I’ve been fortunate to have a front row seat watching their journey as an early investor and board member for 10+ years. It’s been quite the ride.
One of the most striking things about coming to Canva’s product launches is how excited their users are when new features come out. They cheer, applaud, and travel all over the world to share their excitement together.
It reminds me of watching Steve Jobs launch a new version of the Mac or iPod on stage at Apple’s MacWorld over 20 years ago. Rarely do you find a customer base so thrilled and rarely do you find a company who can keep their users so happy and engaged for more than a decade.
I went up to a few folks at Canva Create and asked them about their excitement. “I love it,” one user told me, “when I create a well-designed deck and they ask who I hired to do it—and I tell them I did it myself and they go, ‘wait how?’ And then I tell them about how I did it in Canva.”
Another attendee told me, “They keep launching new features, like 1-click background remover - this will save me hours of tedious work. You don’t know how excited I am about this…” (And he’s even more excited now that Canva just launched their 1-click remover for videos when before it only worked on photos.)
Many companies have terrible business models that deliver bad products which traffic in their users’ misery. They make gobs of money by charging more to reduce their user's suffering, bit by bit. (Think airlines, most enterprise software companies, and products at most large banks).
Canva has done the opposite, for more than a decade. They launch great new products and features that make their products massively more delightful that they almost always don’t charge more for.
And for those that need Canva the most and can least afford it, the company gives away their top version for free (for example to non-profits and schools). It’s a welcome relief from those that seek to exploit their customers for profit by trafficking in their misery and then pretending that they can buy a “premium” version that reduces their suffering.
It’s no wonder that Canva is one of the fastest growing tech companies that still mainly grows from word-of-mouth.
Mel announced there are now 185+ million happy users of Canva each month, most of them who found out about how great Canva was from a friend or colleague. Ten years ago when I discovered Canva there were a couple hundred thousand. I can’t wait to see what happens ten years from now!
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Mesh is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Mesh centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
Mesh works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Mesh offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
- Network Strength: Visualizes the strength of your relationships relative to others in your network
- Timeline: Shows your relationship history with each contact
- Smart Search: Allows you to search using natural language like "People I know at the NYT" or "Designers I've met in London"
- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
- Groups: Organizes contacts into meaningful categories
- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Mesh is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Mesh is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Mesh as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Mesh offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Mesh takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Mesh encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Mesh work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Mesh is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Mesh is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Mesh is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Mesh offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Mesh offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Mesh for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Mesh accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Mesh offers extensive integration capabilities. Mesh introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Mesh supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Mesh also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
Nexus is Mesh's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Mesh makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Mesh's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Mesh isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Mesh instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Mesh is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Mesh can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Mesh's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Mesh has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Mesh a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Mesh's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Mesh's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Mesh has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Mesh's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Mesh as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Mesh eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.