Andrew Chen Joins SparkLabs Taiwan as Venture Partner
Bridging the US Startup Playbook with Asia's Deep Tech Moment
We're excited to share that HFV Managing Partner Andrew Chen has officially joined SparkLabs Taiwan as a Venture Partner.
This isn't a cold start. Andrew has been working alongside the SparkLabs Taiwan team for some time — evaluating early-stage companies, doing hands-on diligence, and advising portfolio founders on how to scale. The Venture Partner title makes official what has already been a deeply rewarding collaboration.
Why SparkLabs Taiwan
SparkLabs Taiwan is part of the SparkLabs Group — a global accelerator network founded by entrepreneurs, for entrepreneurs. Their focus is AI and deep tech founders who are building companies designed to compete on the world stage from day one. That orientation — global ambition baked in at the seed stage — is rare, and it's exactly what drew Andrew in.
Taiwan sits at a remarkable crossroads. It is home to some of the world's most sophisticated hardware manufacturing, deep pools of engineering talent, and a growing generation of founders who are increasingly thinking beyond the domestic market. The question isn't whether great companies will be built here. They already are. The question is how to help them scale faster and further.
Andrew with the SparkLabs, Z Venture Capital, and Line Protostar teams.
What Andrew Brings
Over two decades building in the US startup ecosystem — starting, scaling, and exiting companies across AI, commerce, and fintech — Andrew has accumulated a specific kind of pattern recognition that is genuinely hard to find in this region.
He knows what it takes to raise from US investors. He's navigated the Series A gauntlet, built teams under pressure, and been on both sides of exits. At Flow Commerce, he helped lead the company to a $500M acquisition by Global-e. At CommentSold, he scaled the product organization as CPO through over $5B in GMV. These aren't credentials on a page — they're lived experiences that translate directly into the advice founders need when they're trying to break into global markets.
Alongside that US startup experience, Andrew brings something equally rare: an operator's perspective inside the physical economy. As CEO of AAA World-Wide, a multi-generational marine equipment manufacturer operating across Taiwan and China, he works daily inside the manufacturing and supply chain environment that many of SparkLabs Taiwan's portfolio companies are trying to serve or disrupt. That ground-level view is something most investors simply don't have.
The HFV Thesis Connection
At Hickory Falls Ventures, we've been developing a thesis around intelligence deployed into the physical world — AI systems that don't just live in the cloud, but embed themselves into factories, supply chains, and industrial infrastructure. We believe the next durable wave of AI value creation will come from companies solving high-friction, real-world problems where the barriers to entry are high and the competition is still sparse.
Taiwan is one of the best places in the world to find those companies. The hardware expertise is here. The manufacturing relationships are here. And increasingly, the founders with the ambition to build globally are here too.
This partnership with SparkLabs Taiwan deepens HFV's access to exactly that deal flow — and gives us a meaningful way to give back to the ecosystem that has given us so much.
Looking Ahead
We're excited about what comes next. For the founders in the SparkLabs Taiwan portfolio and pipeline, Andrew's role is straightforward: help you understand what it takes to win in the US and global markets, share what he's learned the hard way over twenty years, and open doors where he can.
For HFV, this is one more step in building the kind of operator-driven, globally-connected investment practice we've always envisioned.
More to come. 🚀
Hickory Falls Ventures is a family office investing in companies building a better world. We focus on intelligence deployed into the physical economy — AI, robotics, industrial systems, and the infrastructure of the future. Learn more at hickoryfallsventures.com.