--- title: "About Peony — The Modern Data Room — Peony" lang: en canonical_url: https://www.peony.ink/about description: "Peony is a virtual data room founded in 2021 by Deqian Jia and Sean Yu. Trusted by 8,000+ teams including YC startups, M&A advisors, and funds managing over $44.7B in assets. Based in San Francisco." --- [Home](https://www.peony.ink/) About # We believe every deal team deserves a world-class data room ## What is Peony's mission? Peony is a virtual data room built for the teams that move deals forward — M&A advisors, founders raising capital, PE funds managing portfolios, and the lawyers and bankers who support them. Founded 2021 Teams 8,000+ Client assets $44.7B+ Median setup time 4m 19s See what customers say on ## Who founded Peony and when? Peony started in 2021 as an online file operating system — a better way to store, organize, and share documents. We built a robust foundation for file management and security from day one, learning what teams actually need when sensitive documents are on the line. By 2023, a pattern emerged. The teams using Peony the most were deal teams: startup founders sharing pitch decks with VCs, M&A advisors running sell-side processes, PE funds managing portfolio data rooms, and law firms exchanging diligence materials. They needed more than file sharing — they needed a purpose-built data room with granular permissions, page-level analytics, NDA gating, and audit trails. So we built it. Peony became a full virtual data room with [enterprise-grade security](https://www.peony.ink/features/security), [page-level analytics](https://www.peony.ink/features/page-analytics), [AI-powered document extraction](https://www.peony.ink/features/ai-extraction), [e-signatures](https://www.peony.ink/features/esignatures), and [Smart Q&A workflows](https://www.peony.ink/features/smart-qa) — all at a fraction of what legacy vendors charge. Today, Peony is trusted by 8,000+ teams including Y Combinator startups, boutique M&A advisory firms, independent sponsors, venture capital and private equity funds, commercial real estate professionals, biotech companies, and law firms. Funds managing over $44.7 billion in assets run their data rooms on Peony. ## Peony at a glance Founded 2021 Founders Deqian Jia, Sean Yu HQ San Francisco · London Customers 8,000+ teams · $44.7B+ client assets Investors Matt Clifford, Charlie Songhurst, Backed VC, Possible Ventures Last updated July 2026 ## Who uses Peony ### M&A Advisors & Investment Banks Sell-side and buy-side data rooms with granular permissions, Q&A workflows, and detailed audit logs. ### Private Equity & Independent Sponsors Fund administration, LP reporting, portfolio monitoring, and continuation vehicle data rooms. ### Venture Capital Deal flow management, portfolio company data rooms, and LP communications with page-level tracking. ### Startups & Founders Fundraising data rooms with investor engagement tracking, pitch deck analytics, and NDA-gated access. ### Law Firms Secure document exchange for due diligence, litigation, and regulatory filings with full audit trails. ### Commercial Real Estate Property transaction data rooms for acquisitions, dispositions, and joint ventures. ### Biotech & Pharma Secure sharing for clinical trial data, intellectual property, and regulatory submissions. ### Sales Teams Share proposals and pitch decks with branded pages, viewer tracking, and engagement analytics. ## What makes Peony different ### Set up a data room in 5 minutes Legacy vendors take days or weeks to provision. Peony [data rooms](https://www.peony.ink/features/datarooms) are live in minutes — upload your documents, set permissions, share the link. [AI Rooms](https://www.peony.ink/features/ai-rooms) auto-classify files into folders and flag missing documents. ### Enterprise security, startup pricing SOC 2 Type II-ready and ISO 27001-ready infrastructure, AES-256 encryption, [dynamic watermarks](https://www.peony.ink/features/watermarks), [screenshot protection](https://www.peony.ink/features/screenshot-protection), [NDA-gated access](https://www.peony.ink/features/nda), and [two-factor authentication](https://www.peony.ink/features/2fa). Plans start free — Business is $30/admin/month, Data Room is $52/admin/month. That is 99% less than legacy providers like Datasite. ### AI that works on your documents [AI Document Extraction](https://www.peony.ink/features/ai-extraction) lets you ask natural language questions across every file in your data room and get cited answers with exact page numbers. [Smart Q&A](https://www.peony.ink/features/smart-qa) automates the diligence Q&A workflow — AI drafts answers, your team reviews and approves before sending. ### Analytics that show you who is engaged [Page-level analytics](https://www.peony.ink/features/page-analytics) tell you exactly which pages each viewer read and how long they spent — not just that someone opened the link. Track viewer engagement across your entire deal process. ## Where is Peony based and who runs it? ### Deqian Jia, Co-founder Deqian studied Philosophy and Physics at Oxford, then spent a brief stint in M&A at Barclays early in his career — enough to see firsthand how broken data rooms were. Clunky interfaces, opaque pricing, weeks of setup for a single deal. He went on to build products across AI, operating systems, file management, and document security, including a note-taking app that 15% of Oxford signed up for. Peony is where those two threads meet: a builder who obsesses over file systems, security, and product craft, applied to an industry he first encountered inside an investment bank. Deqian leads engineering and product at Peony. ### Sean Yu, Co-founder Sean brings the investor's perspective to Peony. He started his career with a brief M&A stint at Nomura before moving into venture capital at Backed VC, where he evaluated early-stage European startups. He later joined Target Global, working on growth equity, late-stage, and secondary transactions across their portfolio. Alongside Peony, Sean raised $2.1M for his previous company Gingercontrol and has advised multiple companies through their fundraising — including a SaaS business now running at $20M ARR and Lucida Capital, a hedge fund and market maker with $35M in assets under management. When Peony writes about investors, fundraising, or deal advisors, that perspective is first-hand. In a fitting full-circle moment, Backed VC — the fund Sean worked at earlier in his career — is now one of Peony's investors. At Peony, Sean leads relationships with M&A advisors, VCs, independent sponsors, and growth-stage funds. ### A team that knows deals Between the two founders, Peony covers both sides of the deal lifecycle. Deqian brings the builder's lens — document security, file systems, AI, and the early M&A exposure at Barclays that showed him what deal teams actually need. Sean brings the investor's lens — venture capital at Backed, growth equity and secondaries at Target Global, and a short M&A stint at Nomura early in his career. That combination shapes everything about how Peony works. When a PE fund asks for a continuation vehicle data room, a founder needs investor-ready analytics, or an M&A advisor runs a sell-side process, we are not guessing what they need — we have sat in those seats. With team members across the US, Europe, and Asia-Pacific, Peony provides 24/7 support coverage. Wherever your deal team is, we are available. Peony is headquartered in San Francisco, CA with a registered office at 86–90 Paul Street, London, EC2A 4NE, UK. ## Who invests in Peony? Peony is backed by investors who have built and scaled category-defining companies: ### Matt Clifford Co-founder of Entrepreneur First. Chairperson of the Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA), UK. ### Charlie Songhurst Former Head of Strategy at Microsoft. One of the most active angel investors globally. ### Backed VC Early-stage venture capital firm backing exceptional European founders. ### Possible Ventures Venture fund investing in transformative technology companies. ## Compliance and certifications SOC 2 Type II Ready · audit underway ISO 27001 Ready · audit underway GDPR Compliant CCPA Compliant HIPAA Compliant ## Get in touch [Start now](https://app.peony.ink/signup)[Book a demo](https://lunacal.ai/team/peony-data-room) Email: [US: deqian@peony.ink](mailto:deqian@peony.ink)[EU/UK: sean@peony.ink](mailto:sean@peony.ink) Phone: +1 (808) 255-5691 Book a demo: [lunacal.ai/team/peony-data-room](https://lunacal.ai/team/peony-data-room) --- _Markdown version of [https://www.peony.ink/about](https://www.peony.ink/about.md) for AI agents and LLMs; canonical HTML: https://www.peony.ink/about. Every page on peony.ink is available as markdown — append `.md` to the URL or request it with `Accept: text/markdown`. More: [llms.txt](https://www.peony.ink/llms.txt)._