Jessica Tsoong

Jessica Tsoong is a Bay Area technology entrepreneur and angel investor. She co-founded WiFiSLAM, a Silicon Valley startup building indoor location-based positioning technologies. The company was acquired by Apple in 2013; press reports at the time put the acquisition price at about $20 million.

After the acquisition, Tsoong joined Apple’s iOS Location team, where she worked on location technologies embedded in Apple devices. She later moved to Apple’s Corporate Development team, focusing on M&A integration.

Tsoong later became an Entrepreneur-in-Residence / Executive-in-Residence at Relay Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on North American startups. BetaKit reported in 2017 that, from Relay’s Menlo Park office, she would handle deal sourcing, investments, and advising portfolio companies on product management and strategy.

Earlier in her career, she worked at Merrill Lynch in sales and trading in the Global Equity Derivatives Group. She earned a BS in Engineering Management Systems from Columbia University in 2008 and an MS in Civil & Environmental Engineering from Stanford University. She serves as Chair of the Columbia Engineering Entrepreneurship Advisory Board, sits on Columbia Engineering’s Board of Visitors, and is involved with StartX.

• Relay Ventures’ stated positioning is “First Money. Founder First.” The firm says it invests at the Pre-Seed + Seed entry stage and supports founders across financing stages.
• Relay’s thesis: “We invest in ideas that go beyond conventional wisdom and solve major pain points within large markets with potential for rapid growth.”
• Sector focus from Relay’s site includes Urbantech: software and hardware systems for autonomy, robotics, and mobility; Proptech: technologies affecting the real estate value chain; Fintech: digitally forward money-flow solutions across insurance, wealth, enterprise, and consumer banking; and Sportstech: sports, media, fitness, gaming, and distribution technologies.
• Tsoong’s personal operating edge appears strongest in mobile, location technology, product management, M&A integration, and founder coaching, based on her WiFiSLAM, Apple, Relay, and Dynamico mentor roles.
• No publicly verified personal angel check size was found.