SoftBank Ventures hires veteran banker Seung Lee as CFO

SOFTBANK Ventures Asia has appointed Seung Lee as its new chief financial officer (CFO) to oversee the management of global funds and limited partners of the early-stage investment vehicle for the SoftBank Group.

Mr Lee will also oversee the financial initiatives of global offices including Beijing, Singapore and Silicon Valley.

Before his new appointment, Mr Lee had set up his own startup, SoftBank Ventures Asia said in a statement. He had also spent more than 15 years at Morgan Stanley in Hong Kong and Seoul advising on mergers and acquisitions, and on raising capital for major corporates.

SoftBank Ventures Asia, which was previously called SoftBank Ventures Korea, operates teams in Seoul, Beijing, San Francisco and Tel Aviv. The firm, which specialises in artificial intelligence-related startups in Asia and has about US$1.1 billion in funds, has said that it plans to open a Singapore office in the first quarter of 2019 as well as open a new Shanghai office.