Benjamin Wey on Why Immigrant Founders Remain an Underpriced Bet in Venture Capital

Benjamin Wey arrived in the United States from Beijing with $62 in his pocket, a one-way plane ticket, and a full scholarship to an American university. 

He started several businesses while still in college, earned two master’s degrees in business from Columbia University, and went on to build a career on Wall Street and lead New York Global Group, an international private equity and advisory firm with venture capital financing among its core disciplines.

His view is direct. The venture capital industry still systematically underprices entrepreneurs who have crossed borders, cultures, and currencies to build something.

The evidence is hard to ignore

The contribution of immigrant entrepreneurs to American innovation is well documented. A 2022 study by the National Foundation for American Policy found that immigrants had started more than half of the US startups valued at $1 billion or more. 

Immigrant founders have built companies that define entire industries, from payments and semiconductors to software and biotechnology.

Benjamin Wey argues that if capital markets were pricing founders efficiently, those results would be reflected in how easily immigrant entrepreneurs raise early-stage money. 

In practice, many still face a harder path at the very start, when networks, familiarity, and pattern-matching carry the most weight.

Why the mispricing happens

In Wey’s analysis, the problem is not usually hostility. It is the ordinary way early-stage investors manage uncertainty.

At the seed stage, there is little data to evaluate. Investors rely on signals: a familiar university, a recognizable former employer, a warm introduction from someone they trust. 

Founders who arrived recently, or whose credentials were earned abroad, often lack those signals even when their abilities are exceptional.

Benjamin Wey describes this as a classic information gap. 

The investor sees less, assumes more risk, and either passes or demands terms that reflect that perceived risk. 

The result is that capital flows away from some of the founders most likely to succeed.

What crossing borders teaches

Wey believes the experience of building a life in a new country develops precisely the traits that venture investors say they want.

• Resourcefulness. Founders who arrived with little learned early to do more with less, a habit that serves any startup trying to stretch its runway.
• Tolerance for uncertainty. Moving to a new country means making major decisions without complete information, which is the daily work of running an early-stage company.
• Cultural range. Founders who operate comfortably in more than one culture often see markets, customers, and supply chains that others overlook, and are well positioned to build companies that are global from the start.
• Persistence. Navigating a new language, legal system, and professional world requires a level of determination that does not disappear once a company is founded.

Benjamin Wey sums up the mindset in words he has shared about his own life: “You only have one life to live. Between life and death is courage.”

How investors can close the gap

Benjamin Wey suggests several practical steps for investors who want to find the value others miss:

• Evaluate what founders have built and overcome, not only where they studied or worked.
• Build sourcing networks that reach into immigrant business communities and international student populations.
• Treat cross-cultural experience as a strategic asset, particularly for companies with global ambitions.
• Offer support on the practical barriers immigrant founders face, from banking relationships to regulatory questions.

None of this requires lowering standards. It requires measuring the right things.

Investing early in the next generation

Benjamin Wey’s interest in this question extends beyond investment decisions. He funds the Benjamin Wey Scholarship for Entrepreneurs, a $1,000 award for undergraduate students pursuing business careers who show entrepreneurial potential, and the Benjamin Wey Grant for Finance Students, a $1,000 award for undergraduates preparing for careers in finance. Both are awarded through essay contests that ask students to present original ideas.

He also supports hundreds of children each year at a rural K through 12 school in Hebei province, China, work described in more detail in this look at his philanthropy and community work.

For Wey, these programs follow the same logic as his view of venture capital. Talent is widely distributed. Opportunity is not. 

Capital, whether it arrives as a scholarship or a seed round, is most valuable when it reaches people who have the ability but not yet the access.

The opportunity in plain sight

Benjamin Wey’s argument is ultimately an investor’s argument. When a category of founders consistently produces outsized results and still struggles to raise early capital, that is a mispriced asset. 

The investors who recognize it, and build the networks and judgment to act on it, stand to benefit most.

He knows the story from the inside. Sixty-two dollars and a scholarship were enough to start. What made the difference was someone willing to bet on potential before it was obvious.