Who Is SY Lee? Story Protocol Co-Founder and Sui Advisor

SY Lee is the co-founder and CEO of PIP Labs, the company behind the Story network, whose token closed 98.46% below its September 2025 record in mid-October 2026. That month the Sui Foundation named him a strategic advisor, years after he sold his fiction app Radish to Kakao Entertainment for $440 million.

Story's record is the precedent Sui holders can check. According to the DATA Foundation, two extensions moved the first release of tokens locked for insiders and investors from February 2026 to February 2028. So, the whole fall from the September 2025 record happened while those allocations stayed locked.

SY Lee at a Glance

Who Is SY Lee?

SY Lee is a founder whose two best-known companies were built around stories and the rights to them, first Radish and then PIP Labs. If you search older records you'll find him as Seung Yoon Lee or Seungyoon Lee, and the singer Lee Seung-yoon is a different person.

PIP Labs lists Lee as its co-founder and CEO and names Andrea Muttoni as a second CEO. Muttoni has led the DATA Foundation, the body behind Story's renamed network, since June 2026. PIP Labs, which the DATA Foundation's notices name as Pen Technology Inc., describes itself as an R&D company contributing to the DATA Network.

Lee is also chairman and co-founder of Poseidon, an AI training-data company that Story incubated in July 2025. In mid-October 2026 he took a seat as strategic advisor to the Sui Foundation, which backs Sui, an alternative Layer 1 blockchain focused on scalability.

SY Lee's Career and Background

Lee's first company was Radish, a serialized-fiction app that sold short episodes for small payments. SoftBank Ventures Asia was its largest investor, and Radish said its revenue grew more than tenfold in 2020.

In May 2021 Kakao Entertainment agreed to buy Radish in a deal valued at $440 million, and Lee stayed on as its CEO. He also became Kakao Entertainment's global strategy officer, leading its growth in international markets.

His Berggruen Institute biography adds two lines to that record. He served as president of the Oxford Union debating society. He's also worked as a venture partner at Hashed, a South Korean blockchain fund.

His next project was Story Protocol, an intellectual property-focused blockchain developed by PIP Labs. At Story his focus later moved from entertainment rights toward data for AI. The DATA Foundation's post on incubating Poseidonnames Lee as the new company's founding president, a role that has since become chairman.

Who Is the Founder of Story Protocol?

SY Lee is a Story Protocol founder and the CEO of PIP Labs, the company that built it, and PIP Labs' team page lists him as its co-founder. The DATA Foundation's July 2025 post on Poseidon calls him Story's CEO and co-founder, so co-founder is the accurate title.

The money arrived in rounds. In August 2024 Story Protocol closed an $80 million Series B led by a16z crypto with Polychain, according to the law firm Fenwick. Lee's Berggruen biography says a16z also led an earlier $30 million round. Story's IP token started trading in February 2025. The original lockup set the first release of team and investor tokens a year later, on 13 February 2026.

In June 2026 the project took a new name and a new market. Story became the DATA Foundation, IP became DATA one for one, and the focus moved from entertainment rights to licensed training data for AI.

What Happened to Story's Token?

Story's token lost almost all of its value while its insider supply stayed locked. Its highest daily close on CoinMarketCap was $13.72, on 21 September 2025. By the mid-October 2026 close it was $0.2109, which leaves it 98.46% below that record.

The DATA Foundation's own notices show how the lock moved. In February 2026 PIP Labs delayed every locked IP release by six months to 13 August 2026. In June 2026 the team and lead investors extended their lockups by 18 months, and in August the board set the new release date at 13 February 2028.

CoinGecko's supply count fits that picture, with about 360 million DATA circulating in mid-October 2026 out of 1.034 billion, or 34.8%.

Method: the 98.46% compares CoinMarketCap daily closes of $13.72 on 21 September 2025 and $0.2109 at the mid-October 2026 close, and the record is the highest close since trading began in February 2025. CoinGecko dates its intraday record to the same day at $14.78 and gives a 98.57% fall to its own mid-October figure.

That's the precedent in one line. A lockup controls when insiders can sell, and it says nothing about what buyers will pay in the meantime. For the mechanics of a lock like this one, read Phemex's guide to how crypto vesting and cliffs work.

Why Did He Join the Sui Foundation?

In mid-October 2026 the Sui Foundation announced that the DATA Network will run natively on Sui with Walrus as its storage layer. In the same post it named SY Lee a strategic advisor to the foundation.

Lee gave his reason in that post. "This is the right home for the network we built, and I am looking forward to helping Sui make it the data layer for AI," he said. He also described the Sui Foundation as the network's largest strategic holder.

For the storage side, our explainer "What Is Walrus (WAL)? Decentralized Storage Token on Sui" walks through how Walrus stores data.

The announcement also quotes Adeniyi Abiodun, Mysten Labs' co-founder and chief product officer, and Phemex's profile of who Adeniyi Abiodun is covers his case for Sui.

How to Trade Sui on Phemex

Phemex has delisted both of Story's IP markets, the perpetual and the spot pair, so you can't trade the token here. A DATA spot pair Phemex listed in September 2024 predates the rename and belongs to a different token, and it's delisted as well.

The tradeable link to Lee's new role is Sui. The SUI perpetual is listed with leverage of up to 50x, and it closed its mid-October 2026 bar at 1.047 USDT, up 1.87% on the day. Futures use leverage, and a leveraged position is closed automatically if losses reach its margin.

If you want a longer view, Phemex's Sui (SUI) price prediction for 2026 to 2031 sets out a Layer 1 growth outlook for the chain.

Phemex's profile of Evan Cheng and Sui's 200-day average adds the trend picture. Story's record is a precedent you can weigh before you trade, and it says nothing certain about where SUI goes next.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is SY Lee?

SY Lee is the co-founder and CEO of PIP Labs, the developer behind the Story network, which took the DATA name in 2026. He founded the fiction app Radish, sold to Kakao Entertainment in 2021, and became a strategic advisor to the Sui Foundation in October 2026.

What happened to Story Protocol?

Story Protocol rebranded as the DATA Foundation in June 2026 and turned to AI training data, and its IP token became DATA one for one. By the mid-October 2026 close the token traded 98.46% below its September 2025 record. The DATA Foundation says insider tokens stay locked until February 2028.

How much did Story Protocol raise?

Its biggest round was an $80 million Series B in August 2024, led by a16z crypto with Polychain, according to the law firm Fenwick. Lee's Berggruen Institute biography says a16z also led an earlier $30 million round.

What does the Sui Foundation do?

The Sui Foundation is an independent organization that supports the Sui ecosystem, with a stated mission of moving billions of users onchain through Sui. It runs funding programs for builders, and in mid-October 2026 it announced the DATA Network's move onto Sui.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and is not financial advice. Cryptocurrency trading involves substantial risk. Always do your own research before making investment decisions.