Principal at Craft Ventures
Check size: Firm-level public estimate: $500K-$3M at Seed, $3M-$10M+ at Series A/B, and $10M+ at Growth
Chen invests in software with a focus on data infrastructure, AI infrastructure, and developer tools. His work with Supabase shows a preference for technically trusted, developer-loved products whose product-led and open-source adoption can be translated into a measurable growth engine and eventually scaled from grassroots usage to enterprise workloads.
Let the product and developer experience lead, then bring cohort data. Show time-to-value, the activation event that predicts retention, acquisition channels, usage across product lines, conversion and expansion, open-source/community dynamics, and how the platform scales from an individual developer's first project to demanding production workloads.
Developer-first products with fast time-to-value, strong product love, open-source community momentum, integrated infrastructure, and telemetry that proves acquisition, activation, retention, and expansion. Chen also values teams that can preserve developer trust while scaling into production and enterprise use.
Developer tools with slow activation, fragmented setup, weak product telemetry, poor retention, or a growth story based on signups and vanity metrics rather than a clear keystone event and cohort-level evidence of sustained use.
Build a cohort-based PLG model that tracks which channels acquire users, what keystone event activates them, why they retain, and how product value drives paid expansion. Source: https://www.craftventures.com/articles/inside-supabases-product-community-led-growth
Treat fast time-to-value, open source, community participation, product telemetry, and scalable infrastructure as a reinforcing system that turns developer trust into durable distribution. Source: https://www.craftventures.com/articles/inside-supabases-product-community-led-growth
“At Craft, we’re big believers in bottom-up PLG and proud to back teams that embrace it.”
— https://www.craftventures.com/articles/inside-supabases-product-community-led-growth
AI-driven software creation increases demand for developer-loved backend infrastructure that can move applications rapidly from prototype to enterprise-scale production.
Successful developer PLG combines fast time-to-value, scalable integrated infrastructure, open-source trust, cohort-based telemetry, a precise activation event, and sustained post-sale value.
+ 106 more investments. View fund →