Flights, beds, train tickets, even the itinerary: Trip.com Group wants a role in every part of your holiday. Its sprawling business reveals both the value of a travel middleman and the trouble that comes with having too much power.

Eric Ye is a General Partner at Eastlink Capital, a Menlo Park-based early-stage VC firm backing AI and data infrastructure founders. A seasoned technologist turned investor, Eric spent over a decade at eBay as Director of Tech Platform and Principal Architect before serving as CTO, SVP of Technology, and Chief Scientist at Ctrip (NASDAQ: TCOM), the world's second-largest online travel agency, where he led 4,000+ engineers and architected the company's transformation into a cloud-native, mobile-first marketplace. Holder of 31 U.S. and China patents, winner of China's Best CTO Award, and a founding partner of Eminence Ventures, Eric now backs mission-driven founders at the seed-to-Series-B stage across AI/ML, distributed databases, cloud infrastructure, fintech, and enterprise software.