How a 23-Year-Old Chinese Woman Without a Harvard Degree Rose from Intern to a16z Partner in Just One Year?
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How a 23-Year-Old Chinese Woman Without a Harvard Degree Rose from Intern to a16z Partner in Just One Year?
The Crypto Journey of Carra Wu, the Harvard Dropout
Navigating Web3 tides with focused insightsIn Silicon Valley, there's a well-known saying:
Every VC professional in Silicon Valley eventually joins a16z as a partner.
Compared to other venture capital firms, a16z operates more like a large corporation, frequently hiring and promoting partners—creating opportunities for many young professionals. This year, a16z welcomed what is arguably its youngest-ever Deal Partner: a 23-year-old Chinese-American woman who rose from intern to partner within just one year.
How did she do it? Today we share an article from INSIDER: The crypto journey of Carra Wu, the Harvard dropout.
Carra Wu is a Harvard University dropout. At the end of 2020, she was wrapping up her internship at Apple and weighing her future career options.
She could accept a full-time role at Apple, return to school, or join a startup... Her experiences interning at tech giants like Apple and Microsoft served as valuable stepping stones for her next move.
On a whim, she sent an email to Arianna Simpson, a venture capitalist at Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and its Crypto Partner. Admiring Simpson greatly, Carra wrote six concise sentences expressing her interest and asking how she could get involved in the crypto space.
That spontaneous email changed Carra Wu’s career trajectory forever.
This is the story of a driven woman in her twenties forging her own unique path amid uncertainty.
In March 2021, Carra Wu landed an internship at a16z—a firm that understands the crypto market better than nearly any competitor and manages a dedicated $9 billion crypto fund. A few months later, she was promoted to Investment Analyst. On her one-year anniversary, she became a Deal Partner—making her the youngest check-signer in the firm’s history and a rising star in the world of crypto investing.
At just 23 years old, backed by a16z’s vast resources, Carra has co-led investments in high-profile crypto startups such as Friends With Benefits, a social crypto club; Axie Infinity, an online game where players collect virtual pets; and Yield Guild Games, a guild enabling players to earn real money through gameplay.
The emerging crypto industry has become fertile ground for investors, offering rare opportunities to young talent on the internet. Some young individuals have been hired by top-tier VCs like a16z, Sequoia, NFX, and Paradigm into entry-level roles—where they make calls, source startups, and help deploy billions of dollars in crypto funds.
If all goes according to plan, these startups may thrive and grow into investor darlings. The young investors who discover them can earn profit shares and peer recognition. In recent years, many of these "prodigies" have leveraged their personal brands to leave big firms and launch their own funds.
A Rocky Path
Most individual venture investors enter the field through one of two paths: founding and exiting a successful company, or leaving private equity or investment banking.
Dressed in a white button-down shirt and blue patterned pants, smiling against a white fence, Carra Wu recalls her early days in venture capital. “I came in through a window,” she says.
This wasn’t Carra Wu’s first time taking a leave of absence from Harvard—she actually took two leaves.
In 2018, she first left school to join Apptimize, a startup analytics company that considered pivoting to crypto but ultimately failed. The following year, Apptimize was acquired by Airship, and Carra returned to Harvard, eventually earning degrees in applied mathematics, computer science, and economics.
In 2019, before graduating, Carra became an intern at Microsoft Garage, where any employee can turn ideas into real-world products. Later, she joined the student team at the Air Force’s Kessel Run software factory, consulting on ways to improve and accelerate software development.
Midway through the project, the pandemic hit, prompting her to take another leave. That’s when she interned at Apple, working on the company’s video game strategy.
During this short internship, a struggling colleague offered her some advice.
He told her: “You don’t need to know what you’re most passionate about in life. You can try many things, identify aspects you enjoy in each, and gradually focus on what truly excites you.”
In 2020, Wu observed how bureaucratic processes frustrated engineers and realized she didn’t want to work at large tech companies like Apple. A new industry was calling her name.
From Intern to Partner in One Year
During the first year of the pandemic, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies saw rising prices and adoption, opening up a new market. People could now use tokens to shop, and Carra sensed that this expansion was attracting new users and massive capital inflows, sparking a wave of projects across decentralized finance, consumer apps, art, and gaming.
So she decided to go “all-in” on crypto. That’s when she reached out to Simpson, the a16z partner, asking if the firm would consider letting her intern.
Until then, a16z had never hired an intern for its crypto team.
“They usually want to invest in people who will stay long-term,” Carra Wu said.
As part of her application, Carra wrote an investment memo on Uniswap, a decentralized exchange whose open data allowed her to analyze its dataset firsthand.
“I wrote code, built a data dashboard, and formed my own insights,” she said.
Eventually, Carra secured the internship.
At a16z, she could dive deep into her passions—crypto gaming and decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs)—and engage directly with founders. Simpson later tweeted that Carra’s hunger to learn made her unstoppable. She once noted that Carra asked questions without fear of looking foolish.
Thanks to this relentless drive, a16z promoted Wu to Investment Analyst last summer.
Carra Wu with the BreederDAO team
Last October, Carra pursued a startup and closed her first deal. She knew other investors were already interested in Pith. Within hours of Simpson reviewing the deal, she received an offer. After dinner, the young investor called the founder.
She hit a small snag: the two founders said they already had commitments from other investors in this round and only a small allocation remained.
But Carra knew a16z would only invest if it could secure a significant stake. So she explained this to the founders and pitched the added value that a firm like a16z could bring. In the end, the founders agreed to reduce allocations for others and make room for a16z.
She underwent hours of coaching from other partners at the firm, which made her feel “fully prepared for that conversation.” “For me, that was a crucial and also terrifying moment,” Carra reflected on the call.
This past March, Carra Wu was promoted again, becoming an a16z Deal Partner. It should be noted, however, that a16z tends to inflate job titles—its “Partner” role is roughly equivalent to Director (mid-level) at other venture firms.
Although Carra has only worked at a16z for one year, she may now have a shorter path to General Partner following the firm’s upheaval in December, when Katie Haun departed, taking several employees with her.
For now, Carra Wu wants to strengthen her network of founders and tap into her colleagues’ collective wisdom. She says she enjoys being an investor, though she doesn’t rule out other career paths.
“Over time, I’ve let go of the idea of making grand plans,” Carra Wu concluded.
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