How to Break into Silicon Valley Featuring Steven Zhao - Founder of Sandbox VR
Growing from zero to 35+ locations with backing from a16z, Justin Timberlake & Katy Perry. How do Sandbox VR go from building in obscurity… to leading one of the world’s hottest VR startups?
Steven Zhao founded Sandbox VR in Hong Kong with one mission: to bring the future of entertainment to life. No celebrity endorsements. No Silicon Valley connections. Just a scrappy team, a bold vision — and relentless execution.
Fast forward to today:
35+ immersive retail locations across the globe
Backed by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Justin Timberlake, Katy Perry & Kevin Durant
Featured in The New York Times, Forbes, and WSJ
Leading the charge in location-based virtual reality experiences
In this fireside, learn from Steven:
How did Steven break out of Asia and win over the world’s top investors?
The hardest lessons building from outside the Valley
Hard truths global founders must face
How he got his first big break — and turned it into momentum
What investors actually look for in founders from Asia
Why being underestimated is his favorite competitive advantage
The decks, intros, and traction that actually worked
Meet Steven Zhao
Steven Zhao is the founder and CEO of Sandbox VR, a leading developer of virtual reality games and apps. Steven has over 10 years of experience in the gaming industry, having founded Blue Tea Games HK Ltd in 2006 and served as its CEO until 2016. Blue Tea Games is best known for developing the popular Dark Parables series of hidden object games.
Before their career in gaming, Steven interned as a QA engineer at Intuit from June to September 2005. Steven has a bachelor's degree in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley.
Steven Zhao received their Bachelor's Degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from UC San Diego.
This event is proudly presented by:
FoundersHK is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization with the mission to build Hong Kong as the next tech hub of the world.
FoundersHK is a global community of entrepreneurs, technology leaders and investors passionate about propelling the next generation of Hong Kong founders to scale and thrive in all parts of the world. FoundersHK is an entryway for Hong Kong founders to Silicon Valley and the rest of the world. We put the right people together, to help Hong Kong founders become an integral contributor to the global community of tech innovation leadership.
FoundersHK is a community where we skip the bullshit, get right to work, and deliver results. For that is the essence of the true Hong Kong spirit.