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500 Global Appoints Three New Partners to Lead Southeast Asia Growth Plans

Early-stage venture fund and seed accelerator 500 Global has appointed Saemin Ahn, Martin Cu, and Shahril Ibrahim as new Partners to lead its initiatives across Southeast Asia.

Saemin Ahn

Saemin brings a decade of experience in growth investing. He was the Founding Managing Partner at Rakuten Ventures, where he led investments in more than 25 technology companies, including GoTo Group, Carousell, Epic, and Coda Payments.

He also has deep expertise in advising companies on public listings and acquisitions. Prior to that, he held management roles at Google in Korea and Singapore.

Martin Cu

Martin was previously Philippines Country Head of Ninja Van. He grew the Ninja Van team in the Philippines to over 5,000 employees, and built a nationwide network serving 97% of the country.

Amid the global pandemic, Ninja Van achieved a company valuation of more than US$1 billion, and Martin played a key role in transforming the firm into a unicorn.

Shahril Ibrahim

Shahril was Director of Investments and Head of Khazanah Americas, a sovereign wealth fund of Malaysia. He established Khazanah Nasional’s presence in the U.S., deploying investments in enterprise technology and deep technology, focusing on AI, ML, and robotics.

He was also a board member at global fusion energy company, General Fusion, and on the advisory committee of growth equity VC firm March Capital.

500 Global has backed more than 340 Southeast Asian companies, with several earning unicorn status including Grab, Bukalapak, Carsome, Carousell, FinAccel, and eFishery.