James Kim

The son of a Marine-turned-cop dad and stay-at-home mom, James grew up in LA’s public magnet programs, finding his tribe among hardcore science and tech nerds. His love of STEM — for both its elegance and its power to improve lives — was forged during those years: stargazing from his backyard, interning at the LASD/LAPD crime lab, running a hand-coded anime file server off his laptop for otaku friends around the world.

After studying astrophysics at Yale and realizing academia wasn’t his path, James fell into education — first as a high school math teacher with Teach For America, then as a college access non-profit leader, and later as a Yale admissions officer. While at Yale, he also served as product manager for a new virtual bridge program for incoming freshmen, rekindling his passion for building useful technology. After earning graduate degrees in business and education from Stanford, he joined Reach Capital, where he has the immense privilege of partnering with founders using tech to elevate human potential.

Outside his day job, James serves on the board of directors for the San Francisco Education Fund. He lives in San Mateo and spends most of his free time with his wife and three kids, and on the hobbies they share, especially escape rooms, chess, and fishing.