Walden International appoints impressive new MD in China

Jack Gao will become general partner and managing director of Walden International's China operations. Walden is a global venture capital company providing early-stage finance to technology firms and one of the first of the VC firms to invest in China.

Gao will be based in China and be responsible for exploring expansion opportunities, raising awareness amongst the investment community and identifying investment opportunities in IT and software. He has over 14 years experience in the software industry having been a research engineer, gained an doctorate in structural engineering and worked for a number of multinational software companies.

Most recently he worked for Microsoft where he was president and general manager in charge of business operations in China. "Jack is an outstanding addition to our management team," says the legendary Lip-Bu Tan, Chairman of Walden International. "His extensive local-market knowledge and business development expertise further strengthen our position as a pioneer and leading venture capital firm investing in the China market."

Tan emphasizes that this appointment will help Walden evolve its business in China to the next stage of having a locally based management team dedicated to capturing prime investment opportunities as the Chinese economy continues to grow and develop.

Explaining his move to venture investing, Gao says, "the essential elements that make up a robust venture capital industry are starting to take shape in China, recent developments including... the WTO... and the increasing maturity of the local equity markets, all provide positive pull factors to encourage entrepreneurship and venture capital investments."

Walden International actively identifies potential portfolio companies in China's communications, semi-conductor, electronics, Internet and sortware and life sciences sectors.