Team Background and History
Three of the co-founders, including Zagabond, 2PM.FLOW, and Location TBA as well as other core team members, went to the same high school in the Bay Area together (Source: The a1rport podcast). The core team consists of people with experience in big tech, banking, startup, gaming, and crypto.
Arnold Tsang, Liz Yang, Alex Xu, Wally Sajimi, and their advisor Rehito Hatoyama are fully doxxed. Alex, Liz, and other team members are known to have attended several real-life events with the community. Others remain active on social media only under pseudonyms.
A big portion of the team has chosen to not reveal their identities publicly so far. As such, most backgrounds are unverified. The exact team size and the reasons to stay private remain unknown.
- Lack of transparency
3 out of 4 founders have not fully revealed their identities yet
Founders
Alex Xu
Zagabond
Co-founder, CEO
10 years of work experience from 0x Labs, Google, Amazon
UNKNOWN
2PM.FLOW
Co-founder, CTO
Worked at Google, went to Y-Combinator
UNKNOWN
Location TBA
Co-founder
Former Facebook software engineer
UNKNOWN
Hoshiboy
Co-founder, CPO
Worked at startups that went to
Y-Combinator twice
Team
Arnold Tsang
Steamboy
Co-creator, Artist
Former Overwatch Character Art Director
Liz Yang
Whizwang
Head of Growth
+9 years of work experience from Goldman Sachs and DFINITY
UNKNOWN
Dem
Head of Community
Former Product Manager at Google & Amazon
Wally Sajimi
Wally
Head of Partnerships
Forbes 2021 30 Under 30, Co-Founder Minti, Endorsify
UNKNOWN
NJOO
Artist
Former artist on Street Fighter Comic
UNKNOWN
Sneaky Chopsticks
Operations
Background unknown
UNKNOWN
JOJO
Software Engineer
Background unknown
Emily Rose
Rose
Community Manager
Background unknown
Brandon Fraser
Skylark
Software Engineer
+6 years of work experience, previously at Block.xyz (Square)
UNKNOWN
Wale Swoosh
Researcher
Background unknown
UNKNOWN
Elena
Researcher
Background unknown
UNKNOWN
Feb.Tea
APAC Ambassador
Background unknown
Advisors
Rehito Hatoyama
Advisor
Ex-Hello Kitty CEO, Ex-Pokemon Advisor, Director of LINE, and Mitsubishi
On May 5, 2022, Chiru Labs has appointed Ray Rehito Hatoyama, as an advisor to their team. (Source: Azuki’s Twitter Account)
Rehito is a distinguished figure in the world of global branding, having previously served as the CEO of Sanrio US/EU, where he played a crucial role in building world-renowned brands like Hello Kitty.
His involvement coincides with the launch of Chiru Labs’ second NFT collection, Beanz – small fictional characters. Given Hatoyama’s track record, the team may be looking to utilize his experience to tap into a younger demographic.