Dave Yen
GP at Orange Collective; founder and product leader in AI
davecyen
San Francisco, California
4.1K connections
Joined March 2024
Summary
Builder‑founder with repeated early‑stage startup experience: Dave has founded and led multiple startups (Roomblocker — YC S15, Cheekies — DTC masks, and later Extract AI), running product, operations, and fundraising at each stage. techcrunch+2
Product leader who ships developer and platform work: his roles at Rigetti and Shopify focused on developer/cloud/platform products; he has written and spoken about building platform experiences and developer tooling for emerging tech such as quantum and AI. aventure+1
Operator turned investor focused on YC‑stage AI startups: as a Co‑Founder & GP at Orange Collective he pools YC alumni capital to back YC founders, authors investment posts on the firm blog, and uses AI‑native tooling in the fund's workflow. orangecollective+1
Community advisor and advocate for open ecosystem approaches: Dave advises YC founders (Startup School), has published advice for founders, and publicly argues for fair competition and open‑source approaches in AI (quoted in WIRED on open‑source AI debates). medium+1
Work
Education
Projects
Writing
Why we invested in Airweave
June 9, 2025Investment memo / blog post on Orange Collective's site explaining why the firm invested in Airweave, covering agent/tool‑calling infra and why it's strategic for agents.
Docs are infrastructure now
May 24, 2025Orange Collective blog post arguing that docs are the system of record for AI agents and describing why the firm backed Promptless.
Keep going
October 1, 2018Personal Medium post offering advice and encouragement to YC Startup School founders, reflecting on setbacks and resilience in founding.
Hobbies
Philanthropic fundraising and community support (ran Cheekies fundraisers and donated proceeds to StopAAPIHate, ACLU, and others). aventure+1
Notes
KPKanishk Parasharsaid that if they were starting a startup,
DYDave Yen
would be someone they'd want as an investor or advisor.Oct 23, 2025
MVMufeed VHsaid that if they were starting a startup,
DYDave Yen
would be someone they'd want as an investor or advisor.Oct 23, 2025
ATAlex Teichmansaid that if they were recommending a top-notch VC partner for a founder,
DYDave Yen
would be one of their first picks.Aug 6, 2025
ATAlex Teichmansaid they've seen
DYDave Yen
add meaningful value (beyond money) to YC alumni companies they've invested in.Aug 6, 2025
ATAlex Teichmansaid
DYDave Yen
is known for being a supportive angel investor or family office for YC company founders.Jul 17, 2025