Brandon Hoffman

Brandon is General Partner of Sunset Ventures, an early-stage venture fund based in Los Angeles & San Francisco that backs founders using emerging technology to change the way everyday consumers live, work, and play. Sunset focuses on the intersection of creativity, mediatech, commerce, and fintech. Prior to Sunset, he was an operator & investor at Samsung Next, the software group of Samsung Electronics. He led R&D efforts for the Chief Innovation Officer around gaming, fintech, wellness, AI, and blockchain. On the venture team, he led more than 20 early-stage venture deals. Notable investments include Ready Player Me (invested before a16z), Wonder Dynamics (acquired by Autodesk), and The Sandbox ($1B val). Before Samsung, he was at Morgan Stanley as an equity research analyst covering US Internet (gaming, ecommerce, social, adtech, payments), where he co-founded the Amazon Disruption Symposium. His insightful reports contributed to reaching the #1 rank Internet team by Institutional Investor. During his time on Wall Street, he worked on high-profile IPOs and initiations, such as Take-Two Interactive (maker of Grand Theft Auto), Blue Apron, elf Beauty, Snap, and Spotify. Brandon started his finance career on “Main Street” in 2006 as a bank teller behind bulletproof glass at the local branch in downtown Anaheim. He used his wages to pay for college and to bootstrap his music company. He spent 10 years as an entrepreneur who built and operated a music production studio. He received an MBA degree in Finance from The Wharton School and an MPA in Behavioral Economics from Harvard Kennedy School. He got his BA from CSU Fullerton at age 20 after transferring from Cypress Community College. Brandon is personally committed to addressing the racial wealth gap in the US through the intersection of innovation and investment. He was a Sheila C. Johnson Fellow at the Center for Public Leadership at Harvard. At Samsung, he launched the Diverse Founders Initiative and co-founded Diverse Angels, an award-winning syndicate that is one of the first and largest inclusive investment platforms in the United States for BIPOC (Black, Latinx, Asian) & women founders. He currently serves as Vice Chair on the board for Toigo Alumni Endowment, as Board Director for the LA County Library Foundation, and as Board Member for the LA chapter of Management Leadership for Tomorrow (MLT).