John Welch

John Welch, Angel investor in Oakland is an active investor based in Oakland, California. This profile covers what John Welch backs, at which stage, and how founders can reach out in 2026.

Mr. John Welch is a Co-Founder and serves as Chief Executive Officer & Chairman at Making Fun. Mr. Welch is an Angel Investor. He served as Chief Digital Officer at Amyris. Mr. Welch co founded PlayFirst, Inc. in 2004. He served as Board Member at SecretBuilders. Mr. Welch served as the Chief Executive Officer of PlayFirst, Inc. Mr. Welch is responsible for the strategic direction of PlayFirst, Inc. Prior to forming PlayFirst, he spent 5 years at AtomShockwave Corp. and served as its Vice President of Games and Product where he drove the product strategy and acquisitions for Shockwave.com. While at AtomShockwave, he built Shockwave.com in to one of the internet's top games portals at 20M unique visitors/month and discovered some of the top independent game developers in the world. From 2003 to 2004 he served as the Chairman of the International Game Developers' Association (IGDA) Online Games group and in that capacity he led the creation of its annual industry benchmark white paper and spoke at numerous games industry events including the Game Developers' Conference and the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3). Prior to Shockwave.com, he served at SEGA from 1998 to 1999 where he designed and built the Sega Dreamcast game console network. Mr. Welch launched his career as a systems integration consultant at Andersen Consulting, then co-founded his own firm which specialized in enterprise solutions. He serves as a Director of PlayFirst, Inc. Mr. Welch holds a Bachelors in Mathematics with Computer Science from MIT and a Master's in Computer Science from the University of Massachusetts.