1Mby1M Virtual Accelerator AI Investor Forum: JP Persico, shuckerVC (Part 1)

Jean-Philippe ‘JP’ Persico, Cofounder and Managing Partner at shuckerVC, discusses his firm’s investment thesis.

Sramana Mitra: So, we are going to start today with a conversation with Jean Phillipe, or JP Persico. I imagine you prefer going by JP?

JP Persico: I do, yes.

Sramana Mitra: JP is Managing Partner at shuckerVC. We met on LinkedIn, haven’t had a chance to actually meet in person, so this is our first meeting. JP, welcome — it’s great to have you.

JP Persico: Thanks for having me.

Sramana Mitra: Since this is your first appearance here, let’s start with a bit of an introduction — your background, about shuckerVC — and then we’ll delve into your investment thesis.

JP Persico: Sure. My background — I’m originally from Switzerland. I grew up in a small town between the three big cities: Basel, Bern, and Zurich. I’ve been in technology my whole life. Since age six, I’ve had a computer. I started with an IBM. My dad brought home computers from his work. He worked for a big oil company and every time they switched — I think almost every nine months back in the ’80s — he brought the old computer home. I started taking them apart, figuring out how they worked, put DOS on them, and I always loved technology and building things from a young age.

I did an apprenticeship in a commercial business, then became a software engineer. I worked on a trading floor where traders were buying and selling electricity between countries. It was one of the major providers in Switzerland. I later went to college — studied business administration — and did some military service in between.

I met my wife, who’s American, and that brought me to the US. In 2015, I started my investment journey. I became a corporate venture capitalist at Bosch. It was kind of random to start that at Bosch, but I took over the corporate strategy department for the North American division. One of the challenges was figuring out how we could grow from the outside without acquiring companies. The goal was to invest in companies.

That’s when I started investing in software companies. So my journey went from software engineer to consultant, to transformation consultant at Bosch, to strategy, and then venture capitalist. I ended up managing a $200 million P&L at Bosch — had a ton of fun.

I then joined a venture studio after Bosch, which brought me to the Bay Area. That experience was interesting, but I really missed the investing side. So we started shuckerVC in 2024.

Sramana Mitra: How big is shuckerVC’s fund, and what is the investment thesis?

JP Persico: Graham and I met 15 years ago. When we started shuckerVC, we had one goal: to bring value to entrepreneurs early in the pre-seed and seed stages. We set out to build a $10 million fund focused on B2B software companies, mostly U.S.-based.

We built the fund on my track record as an investor — prior to shuckerVC, I had a 3.08 DPI track record. It was important to show that we have real investing experience. My co-founder, Graham, brought in his operator experience. He’d launched a fundamental AI company with three neuroscientists and engineers. They built a really interesting company and raised over $130 million. Graham eventually left because he didn’t want to manage large teams — he loves building from zero to one.

That became our core principle: when we invest in a company, we want to help them build — not just give them money and say, “Talk to our advisor network.” We’re hands-on. We help with engineering, product development, and early company building.