Tianyi “Joe” Zhu

Managing Partner, Playground Capital

Tianyi "Joe" Zhu is the Managing Partner of Playground Capital, the North American holdings company of Nanjing Wande Group. Wande is China's largest parks and playgrounds manufacturer with distribution to over 80 countries and equipment in over 300,000 playgrounds across China. He also co-founded SmartHealth Activator, which supported Rosalind Franklin University's plan to build a $50M, 100,000 square-foot Biotech Innovation Park. Joe was recognized in 2017 by the Asian-American Business Development Corporation as one of the "Top 50 Outstanding Asian-Americans in Business" and was recently recognized by the National Association of Asian Pacific's in Politics and Public Affairs for the 2020 List of the Top 40 Asian Pacific Americans Under 40 in Politics & Public Affairs.

Civic service is one of Joe’s key pillars. He serves as the National Co-Chair of Leaders Forum, and is also one of fifteen business leaders selected from across the United States to serve on the Millennial Debt Commission in DC. He also is an Ambassador for the National Asian American Chamber of Commerce (National ACE). In Chicago, he serves on the Chinese Mutual Aid Association board, recently granted 4 million dollars by the State of Illinois to build the first of its kind, Pan-Asian Center. In his personal life, Joe is a professional boxer, who competed in the 2008 Chinese Olympic Trials, and was a former World Amateur Thai Boxing Champion.