Michelle Yu

Michelle Yu is a co-founding partner of Friendly Hill Capital, a Silicon Valley–based investment firm she helped establish in 2015. The firm operates on two tracks: early-stage, high-technology venture investing in Silicon Valley, and property/real-estate development in the Bay Area. Yu is consistently identified across investor databases as the founding partner driving the technology-investment side of the business.

Before founding Friendly Hill Capital, Yu built a career spanning banking, corporate finance, and fund management across Asia and the United States. She worked for Peregrine Investment Holdings, the Hong Kong investment bank, and later served as Public Relations and Investor Relations Director at SOHO China, one of China's largest real-estate developers. She subsequently founded the CITIC Qianjing Trust Fund in Beijing, which focused on debt investments in real-estate projects — experience that carries over into Friendly Hill Capital's real-estate development activity.

Yu was educated in both China and the United States. She earned an undergraduate degree from Beijing Foreign Studies University, an MBA from Yale University, and an EMBA from Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB). Her partners at the firm include Gewei Song, a co-founding partner focused on real-estate projects and funds (and chairman of Kangqiao Real Estate Group in Zhengzhou, China), alongside additional partners and venture partners based in Silicon Valley.

• Invests at the early / seed stage in high-growth technology companies, typically as an angel/fund investor rather than a lead institutional VC.
• Concentrates on what the firm describes as the "most promising fields": AI, healthcare, branded commerce, e-commerce, fintech, and blockchain.
• Geographically anchored in Silicon Valley and the Bay Area, leveraging a China–US cross-border network for deal flow and later-stage growth capital.
• Runs a parallel Bay Area real-estate development strategy, reflecting Yu's background in real-estate trust and debt investing.
• Track record skews toward category-defining consumer, mobility, and fintech platforms — suggesting a preference for large-market, high-scale opportunities.