Yung Wu is a Canadian technology entrepreneur, private equity investor, and corporate director. He founded Castek Software Factory, an insurance enterprise software company acquired by Oracle in 2007, and served as CEO of MaRS Discovery District from 2017 to 2023. He has served as chair of the Toronto Region Board of Trade and as a director of OMERS Administration Corporation.
Wu's parents immigrated to Canada from Taiwan. He earned a BSc in computer science, economics, and mathematics from the University of Toronto and completed the Entrepreneurial Masters Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a member of Mensa and the Young Presidents' Organization.
In 1990, Wu founded Castek Software Factory, a Toronto-based enterprise software company specializing in property and casualty insurance systems. The company's main product, Insure3, was a policy lifecycle administration platform used by insurers in North America, Europe, South Africa, South Korea, and China. In 2005, i-flex solutions (an Oracle subsidiary) acquired a 59.9 percent stake in Castek, and completed the full acquisition in October 2007.
While leading Castek, Wu was named one of Canada's Top 40 Under 40 in 1995.
Wu is managing director and chair of NFQ Ventures, a Toronto-based private equity firm focused on early-stage investing. He served as chairman of Fuse Powered (formerly ByteMark Games), a mobile analytics and gaming company that was acquired by Upsight in January 2016.
Wu has served as a director of OMERS Administration Corporation since January 2018, sitting on its Investment Committee and Governance Committee. In February 2024, he was appointed to the board of directors of MDA Ltd., a TSX-listed space technology company.
Wu was appointed CEO of MaRS Discovery District in October 2017, succeeding Ilse Treurnicht. He came out of semi-retirement for a five-year term, later extended by one year at the board's request.
During his tenure, the MaRS-supported community grew from approximately 1,200 to 1,400 companies. He oversaw the creation of Graphite Ventures, a $100 million private-sector venture capital fund spun out of the MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund.
In April 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada, Wu publicly urged the federal government to act within "days, not weeks and months" to support the innovation sector, calling for blanket acceptance of startups into the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy.
After Wu's departure at the end of 2023, a Globe and Mail investigation reported that his compensation had risen 37 percent during his tenure, from $475,000 in 2019 to $650,625 in 2023 (including an early bonus payment), while MaRS's non-government revenues fell from $29.1 million to $10.1 million over the same period. Wu was succeeded as CEO by Alison Nankivell.
Wu joined the board of the Toronto Region Board of Trade in 2019, served as vice-chair in 2021, and was elected chair of the board of directors in January 2022.
In February 2021, Wu was appointed by Governor-in-Council to Canada's Net-Zero Advisory Body, an independent body advising the federal government on achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. He served until 2023.
In June 2020, Wu co-founded the Coalition of Innovation Leaders Against Racism (CILAR), alongside Armughan Ahmad and Claudette McGowan, to address systemic racism in the Canadian technology sector. The coalition launched with 25 founding members from organizations including KPMG, OMERS, Cisco Canada, and Shopify.
Wu and his wife Katrina co-founded DifferentIsCool (DiSC), a non-profit advocacy organization for inclusion, inspired by Wu's adult brother who has autism.