At the Lunar New Year celebration, Serica hosted a festive convening of world-renowned businesspeople, investors, philanthropists, foundations, nonprofits, and others who are making a positive social impact in the U.S.-China and Asian American space. We came together as a global audience to inspire each other along Serica’s mission, and specifically, our work on educating and cultivating empathy around the issues of Sinophobia and anti-Asian hate. 

We honored four Next Gen leaders who uphold our mission: Congressman Andy Kim of New Jersey; Jennifer Wu, who has provided tireless pro bono representation of victims of anti-AAPI hate, formerly as a partner at Paul Weiss and more recently as Founding Partner at Groombridge Wu; and our Next Gen members Annie Liang-Zhou Founding Partner of Liang Capital Partners, and Yong Zhao, Founder and CEO of junzi kitchen.

The theme for the evening was “The role of Next Gen in building AAPI solidarity.” Our esteemed honorees and keynote speaker at the Serica 2023 Lunar New Year celebration provided tremendous affirmation and inspiration to resilience in the face of anti-Asian hate, and the roles of Next Gen, and intergenerational collaboration in creating social change for the Asian American community. 

This year, Serica and PBS/ WNET partnered to produce a digital AAPI film series, “be/longing: Asian Americans Now,” "be/longing" profiles prominent Asian Americans including Star Trek actor George Takei; CityMD Founder and former CEO Richard Park; and Pulitzer-winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen.

Our February 2023 celebration, in addition to a fireside chat, cocktail reception, casual supper and networking, and an award ceremony for our honorees, was a fundraiser for our next film partnership with PBS/ WNET. This new film series will examine the opportunities for allyship — as well as the prejudices and challenges — that exist between the Asian American community and other marginalized communities in the U.S. We plan to launch this series in May 2023 during AAPI Heritage Month.